n 


bV  4211  .H3 

Henson,  Hensley,  1863-1947 

The  liberty  of  prophesying 


THE  LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 


THE 
LIBERTY  OF    PROPHESYING 


WITH   ITS    JUST   LIMITS   AND    TEMPER.-r^:;pp~p^j^lJ;-r-, 
CONSIDERED   WITH   REFERENCE  /(\-^"^',l^     ^111"'''' 


TO    THE    CIRCUMSTANCES 

OF    THE    MODERN 

CHURCH 


Lyman  Beecher  Lectures  delivered  1909,  before  the  Yale 
Divinity  School,  and  Three  Sermons 


By  H.  HENSLEY  ^  HENSON 

B.D.  (OXON),  HON.  D.D.  (GLASGOW) 

Canon  of  Westminster  and  Rector  of  S.  Margaret's,  Westminster, 

Sometime  Fellow  of  All  Souls'  College,  Oxford 


4  1910 


NEW  HAVEN         ::  ::  CONNECTICUT 

YALE   UNIVERSITY   PRESS         ::  MCMX 


Copyright,  1909,  hy 
Yale  University  Press 


Printed  in  the  United  Stales 


ARTHUR   TWINING   HADLEY,  LL.D. 

PRESIDENT   OF   YALE  UNIVERSITY 
AND 

EDWARD    LEWIS    CURTIS,    Ph.D.,    D.D. 

ACTING   DEAN  OF   THE   FACULTY  OF   THEOLOGY 

THIS   VOLUME   OF    LECTURES 

DELIVERED    WHILE   THEY    WERE   IN   OFFICE 

IS   GRATEFULLY    INSCRIBED 


PREFACE 

The  Lectures  here  published  were  delivered 
on  the  Lyman  Beecher  Foundation  in  Yale 
University  in  1909.  They  are  printed  exactly 
as  they  were  delivered.  Three  sermons  have 
been  added,  all  treating  of  the  Christian  min- 
istry in  one  or  other  of  its  aspects.  These  will, 
perhaps,  serve  to  develop  some  points  too  briefly 
touched  on  in  the  Lectures.  The  sermon  en- 
titled "  Christian  Teaching "  was  originally 
preached  before  the  University  of  Cambridge 
on  November  8,  1908,  and  repeated  in  sub- 
stance before  Harvard  University,  Cambridge, 
Mass.,  on  May  2,  1909. 

There  are  two  objections  which  appear  to  me 
so  probable  that  I  must  needs  think  it  well  to 
anticipate  them.  These  Lectures,  it  will  be  said, 
are  unduly  controversial  and  excessively  local, 
and  on  both  counts  they  are  ill  suited  to  serve 
the  purposes  of  the  Lyman  Beecher  Founda- 
tion. To  the  first  of  these  objections  I  can  but 
answer  that,  in  the  present  circumstances  of 
English-speaking  Christendom,  the  Christian 
ministry  is  inevitably  the  subject  of  acute  con- 


vi  PREFACE 

troversy,  and  that,  since  preaching  is  the  prin- 
cipal function  of  the  Christian  ministry,  any 
effective  discussion  of  it  cannot  avoid  a  contro- 
versial character.  To  the  next,  I  must  answer 
that,  in  allowing  myself  to  give  so  large  a  place 
to  those  aspects  of  my  subject  which  were  mainly 
insular  and  Anglican,  I  was  not  only  keeping 
within  the  sphere  of  my  personal  knowledge 
and  experience,  but  also  bringing  before  my 
hearers  a  point  of  view  which  was  in  their  case 
relatively  unfamiliar.  It  seemed  to  me  that  in 
adopting  this  course,  I  could  best  serve  the  pur- 
pose which  must  have  originally  suggested  the 
invitation  to  lecture. 

It  must,  of  course,  be  frankly  owned  that  I 
chose  a  subject  which  was  apparently  and  acutely 
controversial.  I  did  so  with  a  very  definite 
design  of  directing  attention  to  the  grave  situa- 
tion into  which  the  Christian  preacher  has  been 
brought  by  the  circumstances  of  the  time,  and 
of  emphasizing  certain  manifest  but  most  diffi- 
cult obligations  which  that  situation  imposes. 
Nor  was  I  wholly  without  hope  that  my  handling 
of  a  theme  so  perplexing,  however  inadequate 
and  even  unworthy  in  itself,  might  have  the 
effect  of  inducing  abler  and  better  men  on  both 
sides  of  the  Atlantic  to  address  themselves  to 
its  frank  and  practical  consideration. 

In  addressing  the  clergy  I  have  never  lost 
sight  of  the  laity.     The  Liberty  of  Prophesying, 


PREFACE  vu 

which  I  have  claimed  for  the  first,  can  only  be 
refused  to  the  injury  of  the  last.  I  could  wish 
that  what  I  have  written  might  fall  under  the 
eyes  of  the  religious  laymen  of  the  churches. 
If  I  might  succeed  in  arresting  their  attention, 
I  should  indeed  have  not  written  without  effect. 
For  the  indifference  of  the  Christian  laity  is  the 
most  favourable  of  all  conditions  for  the  develop- 
ment of  "clericalism":  and,  as  surely,  the  best 
of  all  securities  against  "obscurantism"  is  the 
active  and  intelligent  interest  in  ecclesiastical 
politics  of  thoughtful,  religious,  and  educated 
laymen.  The  degree  to  which  the  laity  concern 
themselves  in  the  affairs  of  the  Church  might 
well  be  accepted  as  a  sound  test  of  its  intellectual 
and  spiritual  health. 

In  America  I  suppose  that  the  worst  dangers 
to  the  clergyman's  liberty  are  those  which  arise 
from  the  ignorance  of  congregations,  the  vagaries 
of  religious  individualism,  and  the  "intolerable 
strain"  of  the  denominational  "struggle  for 
existence."  In  England  these  dangers  are  cer- 
tainly not  absent,  but,  at  least  within  the  National 
Church,  they  are  for  the  present  dwarfed  by 
a  domestic  peril,  which  has  no  exact  counter- 
part within  the  other  Protestant  churches. 
The  Tractarian  revival  of  mediaevalism  has 
proceeded  to  great  lengths,  and  its  effects  are 
not  limited  to  the  puerile  craze  for  "pageants" 
in  and  out  of  the  churches.     In  the  now  fashion- 


viii  PREFACE 

able  repudiation  of  the  name  and  character  of 
a  Protestant  church;  in  the  arbitrary  and  pro- 
foundly irrational  emphasis  laid  on  the  letter  of 
the  ancient  creeds;  in  the  growing  isolation  of 
the  Anglican  Church  under  the  withering  influ- 
ence of  the  sacertodalist  dogma;  in  the  substitu- 
tion of  the  personal  authority  of  bishops  for  the 
impersonal  authority  of  law;  in  the  exaltation 
even  by  the  bishops  themselves  of  episcopal 
authority  above  the  Law,  are  enshrined  the 
gravest  menace  to  the  intellectual  liberty  of  the 
Anglican  preacher. 

It  is  indeed  certain  that  a  large  proportion 
of  the  English  clergy,  and  the  immense  majority 
of  English  laymen,  have  no  sympathy  with  the 
tendencies  now  prevailing  in  the  hierarchy;  but 
an  episcopal  church  perforce  utters  itself  through 
its  bishops,  and  the  episcopal  bench  in  England 
is  at  the  present  time  strongly  Tractarian.  In 
these  circumstances  the  discontent,  which  un- 
doubtedly exists,  can  hardly  take  definite  shape 
or  find  effective  expression.  The  situation  is 
assuredly  very  perplexing.  New  interests  are 
crowding  on  to  the  arena  of  public  life,  and  the 
older  interests  are  being  thrust  into  the  back- 
ground. The  sudden  emergence  of  Socialism 
is  diverting  men's  minds  from  spiritual  issues; 
and  the  most  materialistic  version  of  Christianity 
naturally  finds  it  easiest  to  effect  a  concordat 
with  the  new  secularism.     Explain  it  how  you 


PREFACE  ix 

will,  the  public  takes  but  a  languid  interest  in 
the  fortunes  of  the  clergy.  From  every  point 
of  view  the  outlook  for  an  honest  English  preacher 
is  not  very  encouraging. 

If  this  were  the  place,  I  should  like  to  say 
much  of  the  extraordinary  kindness  with  which 
I  was  received  in  Yale,  and,  indeed,  everywhere 
in  America.  How  can  I  ever  forget  the  unweary- 
ing solicitude,  and  considerate  hospitality,  which 
filled  the  time  spent  in  that  wonderful  country 
with  the  pleasantest  memories.  It  must  suffice 
by  this  single  reference  to  indicate  to  my  Ameri- 
can friends  the  deep  sense  which  I  have  of  their 
goodness,  and  to  assure  them  that  the  recollec- 
tions of  my  first  visit  to  the  New  World  (which 
they  induced  me  to  undertake)  are  in  the  fullest 
sense  delightful. 

H.  H.  H. 

Westminster  Abbey, 

August  lo,  1909. 


CONTENTS 

LYMAN  BEECHER  LECTURES 

PAGE 

I    Functions  and  Claims  of  the  Preacher  .  i 

II    Of  Denominational  Subscriptions    ...  31 

III  Of  Evidences  of  Personal  Belief   ...  62 

IV  Of  the  Interpretation  of  Scripture  in  Ser- 

mons      92 

V  Of  Reserve,  and  the  Casuistic  Problem  In- 
volved IN  THE  Preacher's  Use  of  Scrip- 
ture      122 

VI    Of  Social  and  Political  Preaching  .     .     .  152 

VII     Of  Proportion  in  Religious  Teaching    .     .  184 

VIII    Objections  and  Conclusions 214 

SERMONS 

IX    Divine  Vocation 244 

X    Authority  in  Religion 260 

XI    Christian  Teaching 273 


THE  LIBERTY  OF  PROPHESYING 


FUNCTIONS    AND    CLAIMS    OF    THE    PREACHER 

Preaching  may  perhaps  be  described  as  the 
principal  function  of  the  Christian  minister. 
Even  on  the  sacerdotalist  hypothesis  of  the  min- 
istry, it  is  only  in  his  capacity  as  preacher  that 
the  Christian  minister  can  bring  any  important 
contribution  of  his  own  to  the  work  of  the  min- 
istry. To  the  validity  of  sacraments,  of  course, 
he  can  add  nothing  by  his  virtues  and  efforts, 
and  from  such  validity  his  vices  and  negligences 
can  withdraw  nothing.  That  "the  unworthi- 
ness  of  the  ministers  hinders  not  the  effect  of 
the  sacrament"  is  the  indispensable  postulate 
of  sacerdotaHsm,  and  has  been  vehemently 
insisted  upon  by  the  Church  against  countless 
heretics.  As  soon,  however,  as  the  "priest" 
leaves  the  "altar"  or  the  confessional,  and 
enters  the  pulpit,  the  situation  changes.  Much 
turns  there  on  the  preacher's  personal  fitness  for 
his  work,  and  on  the  conception  he  has  formed 


2  THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

of  it.     His  personal  sincerity,   his  known  con- 
victions,   his    acquired    knowledge,    his    natural 
ability,   even   his  reputation,   appearance,   man- 
ner, and  voice,  will  all  have  a  bearing  on  his 
preaching,    and   affect   its   fortunes.     The   truth 
of  his  message,  of  course,  is  independent  of  the 
particular  form  in  which  he  may  present  it,  but 
its  power  to  attract  men,  secure  their  audience, 
and  affect  their  minds  will  be  to  a  very  con- 
siderable   degree    contingent   on   the   individual 
through  whom  it  was  delivered.     It  is,  indeed, 
never  to  be  forgotten  that  the  saving  power  of 
the  Gospel  of  Christ  is  at  all  times  beyond  the 
control  of  the  preacher.     There  is  a  mysterious- 
ness  in  Divine  action  which  eludes  observation 
and  defies  analysis.     You  may  not  teach  the  art 
of  winning  souls  from   Chairs   of   Rhetoric,   or 
cast  into  a  formula  the  secret  of  waking  con- 
sciences.    "The  wind  bloweth  where  it  hsteth, 
and  thou  hearest  the  voice  thereof,  but  knowest 
not  whence  it  cometh,  and  whither  it  goeth:  so 
is  every  one  that  is  born  of  the  Spirit."     The 
fortunes  of  the  Divine  seed  are  strangely  deter- 
mined by  the  state  of  the  human  soil  into  which 
it  is  cast;  and  that  vitally  important  condition 
is  never  completely  known   to   the  sower,   and 
often  is  almost  altogether  outside  his  knowledge. 
In  all  cases,  we  may  never  forget,  the  spiritual 
result  of  preaching  lies  beyond   the  preacher's 
vision  and  control.      As  if  for  ever  to  disallow 


THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING  3 

the  too  facile  suggestions  of  vanity,  and  once 
for  all  to  cut  the  springs  of  that  excessive  hom- 
age which  is  so  readily  offered  to  the  preacher's 
eloquence  and  personal  charm,  the  Almighty 
has  willed  to  effect  His  most  dramatic  spiritual 
conquests  through  the  unlikeliest  instruments. 
The  preacher  counts  for  little  in  the  record  of 
the  greater  conversions  of  Christian  history. 
The  preaching  of  Stephen  left  Saul  of  Tarsus 
apparently  untouched:  the  sermons  of  S.  Am- 
brose impressed,  but  did  not  convince,  Augus- 
tine :  no  preacher  brought  S.  Francis  to  Christ, 
or  Martin  Luther,  or  Ignatius  Loyola,  or 
our  own  later  prophets,  Bunyan,  Fox,  and 
Wesley.  None  of  these  could  be  claimed  by 
any  human  teacher  or  preacher  as  the  trophy  of 
his  ministerial  warfare,  and  yet  the  whole  course 
of  Christianity  has  been  affected  by  their  conver- 
sion. Their  experience  has  been  reproduced  in 
countless  instances  of  less  conspicuous  Chris- 
tians. We  cannot,  then,  emphasize  too  strongly 
the  independence  of  His  own  appointed  agencies 
which  has  marked  the  action  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
from  the  first,  and  it  is  important  that  we  should 
do  this  in  order  that  with  a  deeper  humility  we 
may  do  full  justice  to  the  fact  that  such  ap- 
pointed agencies  exist,  and  have  ever  formed  the 
ordinary  means  of  Divine  activity.  Of  these 
agencies  preaching  must  certainly  be  regarded 
as  the  most  authoritative  and  the  most  effica- 


4        THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

cious;  and  with  respect  to  preaching  we  have 
to  recognize  the  perplexing  and  dismaying  truth 
that  its  effectiveness  depends  in  a  degree  which 
it  is  difficult  to  exaggerate  upon  the  personal 
competence  and  labour  of  the  preacher. 

The  recognition  of  this  truth  ought  to  deter- 
mine the  preacher's  estimate  of  his  office,  and 
his  treatment  of  it.  S.  Paul  was  using  no  mere 
figure  of  speech  when  he  described  the  Chris- 
tian minister  as  "  God's  fellow- worker."  Rather 
it  is  the  most  suggestive  because  also  the  most 
accurate  definition  of  the  ministerial  office. 
Called  to  a  sublime  partnership  with  his  Creator, 
the  preacher  must  concentrate  all  his  powers  on 
the  ministry  which  he  has  received.  His  natural 
abilities  must  be  carefully  cultivated;  no  effort 
must  be  considered  too  great  for  the  attainment 
of  the  knowledge  required  for  reHgious  teaching: 
sympathy  and  wisdom  must  direct  the  trained 
faculties  and  the  accumulated  learning:  vigilant 
practice  must  perfect  what  enthusiasm  began. 
Only  so  will  the  human  agent  in  any  measure 
answer  to  the  Divine  purpose  in  his  ministry. 
So  long  as  the  obligation  of  this  sublime  response 
to  the  vocation  and  claim  of  God  be  paramount 
in  the  preacher's  mind,  he  will  be  in  little  danger 
of  falling  into  either  of  the  different  yet  allied 
errors  which  mostly  threaten  him.  On  the  one 
hand,  he  will  not  be  able  to  think  meanly  of  his 
office;  on  the  other  hand,  he  will  not  exaggerate 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING  5 

the  value  of  his  personal  contribution  to  the  min- 
istry of  preaching.  Straining  to  reach  the  high- 
est conceivable  standard,  he  dare  not  acquiesce 
in  any  version  of  duty  less  than  the  best  of  which 
he  is  capable.  He  will  not  sink  to  the  sham 
humility  which  excuses  the  preacher's  ignorance 
or  indolence  by  the  plea  that  in  conversion  God 
must  be  all  in  all.  The  question  for  the  honest 
preacher's  conscience  is  not  how  little  use  he 
may  be,  but  how  much  he  ought  to  be,  when  God 
is  working  through  and  with  him.  This  will 
be  the  spur  of  unceasing  effort  —  not  pride,  or 
ambition,  or  professional  zeal,  but  the  convic- 
tion that  "it  is  required  in  stewards  that  a  man 
be  found"  faithful. " 

Here  it  may  fairly  be  objected  that  a  fallacy  is 
latent  in  the  very  word  "preaching,"  which 
surely  could  not  bear  one  and  the  same  sense 
throughout  the  whole  period  since  Christianity 
began.  What  is  there  really  in  common  between 
the  preaching  of  which  S.  Paul  wrote,  and  that 
which  we  must  have  in  mind  throughout  these 
lectures?  Is  it  possible  without  extravagance 
to  identify  the  subject-matter  of  ordinary  modern 
sermons  with  that  Divine  "gospel"  which  the 
Apostle  declared  himself  under  "necessity"  to 
preach?  Clearly  there  is  need  for  some  prelim- 
inary definition  of  terms,  and  explanation  of 
methods. 

It  certainly  must  be  admitted   that  between 


6  THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

the  preaching  of  the  first  days  of  Christianity 
and  that  of  the  twentieth  century  there  is  a  very 
great  difference.  S.  Paul,  the  greatest  of  all 
the  apostolic  preachers,  was  preeminently  a 
missionary,  and  his  normal  preaching  must  find 
such  parallel  as  the  modern  Church  can  offer  in 
the  mission  field.  Even  so  the  parallel  is  by  no 
means  close,  for  the  Christian  Apostle  fulfilling 
his  task  within  the  Roman  Empire  had  no  experi- 
ence of  the  characteristic  difficulties  of  the  mis- 
sionary of  our  own  time,  who  must  bring  his 
message  to  the  members  of  the  ancient  religious 
systems  of  Asia,  or  to  the  fanatical  followers  of  the 
Arabian  prophet,  or  to  the  variously  degraded  bar- 
barians of  Africa.  In  spite,  hov/ever,  of  great 
differences,  there  is  a  recognizable  identity  of 
function  and  fortune  between  Christian  mission- 
aries in  all  ages  and  in  all  circumstances.  The 
preaching  with  which  we  are  concerned  in  these 
lectures  is  not  that  of  missionaries,  and  has  but 
little  of  the  evangelistic  character.  In  an  ancient 
Christian  society  the  ministry  is  not  mainly  con- 
cerned with  "proclaiming"  the  "good  tidings" 
of  redemption,  but  rather  with  teaching  pro- 
fessed believers  the  true  content  and  practical 
significance  of  their  behef.  In  the  New  Testa- 
ment the  functions  of  "preaching"  and  "teach- 
ing" appear  to  be  distinguished,  and,  though 
both  might  be  united  in  the  same  individual,  as 
certainly  was  the  case  with  the  Apostles  them- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING  7 

selves,  yet  commonly  they  were  assigned  to  dif- 
ferent persons.  In  the  work  of  the  modern 
preacher  "preaching"  and  "teaching"  must 
always  be  combined,  and  the  two  functions  will 
in  practice  be  difficult  to  keep  distinct.  All  this 
bears  very  importantly  on  the  conception  we 
must  form  of  the  modern  preacher's  duty. 

If  for  the  "preacher"  as  such  it  may  be  thought 
that  no  more  knowledge  is  requisite  than  that 
of  the  "gospel"  which  he  is  to  proclaim,  and 
which  he  himself  has  accepted,  —  and  this  is 
precisely  the  apology  which  is  offered  for  the 
illiterate  evangelists  of  our  time,  —  for  the 
"teacher"  manifestly  a  different  rule  must  be 
necessary.  He  has  to  make  that  "gospel"  the 
basis  of  moral  and  intellectual  discipline:  to 
show  its  bearing  on  thought  and  action:  to  make 
clear  its  obligation  with  respect  to  the  many 
perplexing  demands  of  social  and  political  duty: 
to  vindicate  its  truth  against  rival  systems  of 
belief  and  knowledge,  which  disallow  and  seem 
to  disprove  it.  The  modern  preacher,  there- 
fore, must  become  the  theologian,  the  moral 
philosopher,  the  casuist,  the  controversial  di- 
vine, the  apologist  of  the  faith;  and  in  every 
one  of  these  characters  he  will  stand  in  need 
of  specific  knowledge,  experience,  wisdom,  and 
skill. 

The  mere  statement  of  the  situation  indicates 
sufficiently    the   discrepancy   which   cannot   but 


8         THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

exist  between  the  preacher's  theory  of  office,  and 
his  personal  competence  to  reduce  that  theory  to 
practice.  Who  could  possibly  be  equal  to  the 
demands  of  an  office  so  many-sided  and  touching 
so  many  interests?  Necessarily  the  ministry  has 
fallen  far  short  of  its  theoretical  functions.  As 
the  Church  extended,  and  made  acquaintance 
with  new  and  perplexing  situations,  there  was 
effected  an  allocation  of  duties  within  the  ranks 
of  the  official  ministry.  There  were  professional 
theologians,  moral  philosophers,  casuists,  con- 
troversial divines,  apologists,  and  these  prepared 
the  work  for  the  preachers.  So  long  as  the  tradi- 
tion of  Christian  teaching  was  within  the  Church 
uniform,  authoritative,  and  unquestioned,  it 
sufficed  that  the  individual  preacher  should  draw 
upon  the  general  resources  of  orthodox  religion; 
but,  with  the  emergence  of  the  characteristic 
conditions  of  modern  Christianity,  another  and 
still  more  perplexing  situation  was  created  for 
the  preacher.  He  had  to  make  his  count  with 
a  confused  doctrinal  tradition,  and  a  disunited 
Church;  perforce  he  had  to  choose  between  con- 
flicting authorities,  and  sit  in  judgment  on  the 
creed  he  would  elect  to  defend.  Accordingly, 
albeit  necessarily  dependent  on  the  learning  and 
thought  of  others,  he  had  to  sustain  before  his 
congregation  the  character  of  teacher,  and  accept 
full  personal  responsibility  for  whatsoever  teach- 
ings   he    adopted.      The    very    multitude    and 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING  9 

variety  of  experts  would  compel  him  to  exercise 
discrimination  in  his  choice  of  guides,  so  that  in 
the  last  result  what  he  offered  to  his  congregation 
would  have  behind  it  no  better  guarantee  than 
that  of  his  own  personal  competence.  We  may 
observe  that  this  inalienable,  plenary,  and  mani- 
fold responsibihty  of  the  preacher  is  generally 
recognized  in  his  preparation  for  the  ministry, 
which,  however  inadequate  in  quality,  is  not  as 
a  rule  insufiEicient  in  range.  Theology,  moral 
philosophy,  ecclesiastical  history,  casuistry,  con- 
troversy, apologetics,  are  all  included  in  the  course 
of  professional  training,  though  none  can  be 
taught  in  more  than  the  barest  outhne. 

Experience,  indeed,  shows  that  the  actual  situ- 
ation of  the  modern  preacher  may  be,  and  com- 
monly is,  far  less  difficult  than  its  theoretical 
statement  suggests.  The  perplexities  of  Chris- 
tendom are  not  necessarily  perceived  within  a 
parish  or  congregation;  and  religious  use  and 
wont  will  go  far  to  provide  a  working  substitute 
for  authority.  The  multitude  of  Christian  folk 
are  too  simple  and  uneducated  to  raise  any  doc- 
trinal questions  which  would  seriously  perplex 
the  preacher,  whose  difficulties,  if  he  has  any, 
will  for  the  most  part  be  self -proposed.  The 
standing  themes  of  Christian  preaching  are  still 
invested  with  so  profound  reverence  that,  what- 
ever may  be  the  case  privately  and  in  the  minds 
of  men,  open  questioning  will  hardly  be  toler- 


lo        THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

ated  within  religious  circles.  An  uncriticised 
convention  prescribes  for  the  preacher  what  he 
must  say,  and  what  he  ought  to  think,  with  re- 
spect to  all  the  greater  concerns  of  faith  and 
life;  let  him  but  respect  that  convention,  and 
his  difficulties  need  not  be  great,  while  his 
professional  success  may  be  considerable.  Such 
respect,  however,  is  plainly  becoming  more  diffi- 
cult, and  the  best  modern  preachers  feel  the 
difficulty  most  acutely. 

A  quiet  Hfe  and  a  popular  ministry  do  not  ap- 
pear the  worthiest  objects  of  a  Christian  preacher's 
effort.  His  own  conscience  and  his  own  reason 
insist  upon  having  satisfaction  also,  and  the 
whole  sincerity  of  his  preaching  turns  on  the 
circumstance  whether  or  not  that  satisfaction 
can  be  found.  The  preacher's  personal  claim 
cannot  be  considered  apart  from  other  claims 
with  which  it  is  inseparably  connected,  which 
are  not  less  legitimate,  or  less  important,  and 
which  lend  themselves  more  easily  to  satisfac- 
tion. There  are  the  claims  of  the  congregation, 
of  the  denomination,  of  the  Christian  Church, 
even  of  the  State,  all  of  which  are  intertwined 
with  the  preacher's  demand  for  "Liberty  of 
Prophesying."  The  adjustment  of  these  com- 
peting claims  is  the  standing  problem  of  rehgious 
statesmanship,  and  many  circumstances  of  our 
times  have  rendered  the  solution  of  it  a  specially 
urgent  and   a  specially   difficult  matter.      Two 


THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING         ii 

of  these    circumstances    deserve    our  particular 
attention. 

In  the  first  place,  Christianity  no  longer  holds 
the  supreme  position  which  for  centuries  it  has 
held  in  the  thought  of  civiHzed  men.  The  realm 
of  knowledge  has  been  so  greatly  extended  within 
the  last  few  generations,  and  the  diffusion  of 
knowledge  has  of  late  years  been  so  rapid,  that 
a  situation  has  been  created  which  has  no  real 
precedent  in  Christian  experience.  In  the  an- 
cient world,  indeed,  before  the  downfall  of  the 
Roman  Empire,  the  Church  was  confronted  by 
a  society  which  had  the  prestige  of  an  immemorial 
civilization,  and  was  richly  endowed  with  art, 
science,  and  Hterature.  Paganism  contested  the 
ground  with  Christianity  with  many  sources  of 
strength,  but  the  extreme  disadvantage  of  its 
grotesque  and  immoral  creed  more  than  coun- 
terbalanced its  advantages  in  other  respects. 
Christianity  conquered  the  ancient  world  by 
clear  title  of  moral  and  intellectual  superiority. 
The  downfall  of  the  ancient  empire,  however, 
altered  the  situation  greatly  to  the  advantage  of 
the  Church.  Among  the  Teutonic  barbarians, 
who,  on  the  morrow  of  overthrowing  the  im- 
perial system,  accepted  the  yoke  of  the  imperial 
Church,  Christianity  had  no  rival.  Their  pagan- 
ism was  a  poor  and  powerless  thing,  which  had 
no  characteristic  art,  literature,  or  architectural 
monuments  to  preserve  its  spirit  and  perpetuate 


12  THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

its  influence;  civilization  not  less  than  religion 
was  the  gift  of  the  Christian  missionaries.  Ac- 
cordingly, mediaeval  Christendom  had  the  aspect 
of  a  social  order  rooted  in  religion  and  every- 
where coloured  by  it.  Thought  and  life  were 
controlled  by  Faith.  Theology  was  the  queen 
and  sum  of  the  sciences.  Philosophy  and  his- 
tory were  the  handmaids  of  orthodox  dogma; 
literature  and  the  arts  aspired  to  illustrate  and 
exalt  the  reigning  creed.  No  doubt  there  were 
many  recalcitrant  movements  of  the  intellect 
and  the  conscience  throughout  the  Middle  Ages, 
but  in  the  prevailing  state  of  knowledge  these 
could  not  find  any  effective  or  enduring  expres- 
sion. The  Renaissance  was  perhaps  as  much 
the  revelation  of  existing  forces,  as  the  introduc- 
tion of  new  ones.  It  brought  the  great  discov- 
ery that  humanity  could  no  longer  be  confined 
within  the  strait  limits  of  mediaevahsm,  that  the 
regime  of  mere  authority  had  reached  its  term 
in  Church  and  State,  that  the  individual  spirit 
had  come  to  maturity,  and  would  claim  its  herit- 
age of  freedom.  That  crucial  phase  of  the  Re- 
naissance, which  we  are  accustomed  to  call  the 
Reformation,  witnessed  the  vehement  assertion 
of  the  independence  of  the  individual  conscience 
and  reason.  The  affirmation  and  enthronement 
of  the  principle  of  private  judgment  in  rehgion 
were  its  transcendent  achievements.  In  the 
course  of  the  centuries  which  have  passed  since 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        13 

that  epoch  of  enfranchisement,  Christendom 
has  been  revolutionized.  Not  only  has  the 
volume  of  human  knowledge  been  vastly  in- 
creased, but  the  very  conception  of  knowledge 
has  been  altered,  and  the  relative  importance 
attached  to  the  different  kinds  of  knowledge  has 
wonderfully  changed.  The  sciences  called  phys- 
ical, or  natural,  have  acquired  a  sound  method, 
and  by  its  aid  attained  to  results  which  have  not 
only  effected  a  revolution  in  the  conditions  of 
human  life,  but  have  deeply  influenced  the  whole 
course  of  human  thought.  Every  fresh  discov- 
ery, every  advance  in  the  practical  apphcation 
of  scientific  discoveries,  every  phase  of  philo- 
sophical speculation,  has  had  its  effect  within 
the  sphere  of  theology.  Moreover,  we  may 
almost  say  that  within  the  last  century  a  whole 
series  of  new  sciences  have  come  into  existence 
which  directly  bear  upon  Christianity.  The 
more  exact  study  of  language,  the  criticism  of 
texts  and  documents,  the  science  of  comparative 
rehgion,  the  apphcation  of  psychology  to  the 
phenomena  of  faith  —  these  are  practically  new 
studies,  and  they  impinge  directly  on  the  terri- 
tories of  Christian  belief.  One  result  of  this 
vast  and  various  intellectual  movement  has  been 
the  dethronement  of  theology  from  its  ancient 
supremacy,  and  the  substitution  of  its  younger 
rivals.  An  immense  and  various  secular  litera- 
ture has  come  into  existence,  and  human  life  in 


14        THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

civilized  communities  has  become  filled  beyond 
all  precedent  with  secular  interests.  Everywhere 
the  Christian  Church  has  been  outgrown  by 
the  popular  Hfe,  and  has  declined  into  one  fac- 
tor, albeit  still  the  greatest,  of  the  social  order 
of  Christendom.  Christianity  is  plainly  in  pres- 
ence of  a  non-Christian  public,  which  regards  it 
with  curiosity,  or  impatience,  or  disHke,  or  open 
hostility,  never  with  deference  or  affection.  Two 
cultures  are  in  existence,  an  old  and  a  new,  and 
these  are  shaping  two  types  of  character,  and 
projecting  on  the  horizon  of  human  thought  two 
ideals  of  life.  Even  within  the  nominal  member- 
ship of  the  Christian  churches  the  conflict  of 
ideas  has  made  its  appearance,  and  expresses 
itself  in  that  difference  between  the  lay  mind 
and  the  clerical,  which  has  become  one  of  the 
salient  features  of  modern  ecclesiastical  politics. 
Within  the  Roman  Catholic  sphere  the  situa- 
tion has  developed  into  a  dangerous  crisis,  for 
there  the  principle  of  authority  has  been  pushed 
to  its  logical  conclusion,  and  the  new  demands 
of  the  modern  world  have  been  met  by  steady  and 
relentless  negation.  The  divergence  between 
the  official  doctrine  of  the  Church  and  the  ac- 
cumulated knowledge  of  mankind  has  become 
extreme,  and  arrests  the  attention  of  the  multi- 
tudes to  whom  the  modern  state  has  brought 
the  elements  of  education.  Education  and  the 
Church  have  the  aspect  of  natural  antagonists: 


THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING         15 

the  citizen  has  to  make  his  choice  between  loyalty 
to  the  modern  State,  to  which  perforce  he  is 
ever  more  closely  bound,  and  obedience  to  a 
Church  which  claims  to  be  international  and 
supernational,  infallible,  and  unchanging.  In 
every  sphere  of  thought,  in  every  department  of 
social  Hfe,  over  the  whole  field  of  politics,  the 
battle  is  joined.  The  extraordinary  interest 
everywhere  manifested  in  the  so-called  Modernist 
movement  within  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 
attests  the  general  apprehension,  that  unless  some 
reconciHation  can  be  effected  between  Christian- 
ity and  the  modern  world,  the  gravest  conceiv- 
able disasters  to  human  society  cannot  be  averted. 
For  manifest  reasons  the  crisis  within  the  sphere 
of  the  Reformation  is  less  acute.  The  neces- 
sity of  harmonizing  theology  and  the  accumu- 
lated knowledge  of  mankind  might  seem  to  be 
the  necessary  assumption  of  every  reformed 
Church,  for  on  no  other  assumption  could  the 
immense  breach  with  the  doctrinal  tradition  of 
Christendom  implied  in  the  fact  of  reformation 
be  justified.  Human  nature,  however,  is  bewil- 
deringly  illogical,  and  never  so  much  so  as  in 
the  conduct  of  its  religious  concerns.  Yet  no 
extreme  of  illogical  obscurantism  has  been  able 
to  carry  any  reformed  Church  to  such  uniform- 
ity of  hostile  prejudice  as  that  which  has  marked 
the  attitude  of  the  Roman  Church  towards  new 
knowledge.     The  religious  heirs  of  the  greatest 


i6        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

theological  innovation  of  history  have  not  been 
able,  in  spite  of  themselves,  to  escape  from  the 
law  of  their  position.  Theological  obscurantism 
within  the  Protestant  sphere  is  illogical,  half- 
hearted, and  ineffective.  Persecution  on  the 
basis  of  a  formal  recognition  of  private  judgment 
is  too  manifestly  paradoxical  to  be  either  im- 
pressive or  permanent.  Accordingly,  the  conflict 
of  old  and  new  has  within  the  Protestant  sphere 
been  less  embittered,  less  universal,  less  extreme. 
Nevertheless  there  also  it  proceeds,  and  creates 
for  the  churches  a  situation  of  grave  embarrass- 
ment. An  educated  laity,  still  attached  to  the 
churches,  has  come  into  existence,  and  is  bring- 
ing a  new  and  powerful  influence  to  bear  on  eccle- 
siastical affairs.  The  intellectual  conditions  of 
preaching  are  seen  to  be  of  more  than  clerical 
concern.  A  preacher  in  bondage  to  doctrinal 
forms,  which  cannot  fairly  be  reconciled  with  the 
well-established  knowledge  of  the  time,  is  seen 
to  be  ill-placed  for  maintaining  that  standard  of 
personal  sincerity  which  is  indispensable  to  effect- 
ive teaching,  and  condemned  to  a  loss  of  public 
respect,  which  must  in  the  long  run  be  fatal  to 
spiritual  influence.  The  modern  preacher  can- 
not be  indifferent  to  the  intellectual  demand  of 
the  educated  laity,  nor  can  he  Hghtly  draw  upon 
his  ministry  the  suspicion  of  disingenuousness. 
Already  there  are  not  lacking  signs  of  a  decline 
in  the  influence  of  the  pulpit,  and  the  Protestant 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        17 

churches  are  said  to  be  losing  their  hold  on  the 
pubHc  Hfe  of  the  time. 

In  the  next  place,  the  difficulty  of  recruiting 
the  ranks  of  the  ministry  is  forcing  itself  into 
notice  within  all  the  Christian  churches.  No 
doubt  there  are  many  reasons  for  this  disquiet- 
ing fact,  and  some  of  the  most  important  lie 
outside  the  control  of  the  ecclesiastical  author- 
ities altogether.  The  enhanced  interest  of  human 
life,  to  which  we  have  adverted,  and  its  increas- 
ing secularity  have  their  influence  on  men's 
minds,  and  indispose  them  to  regard  with  favour 
the  career  of  a  Christian  preacher.  The  atmos- 
phere of  modern  life  is  mundane  and  selfish; 
the  fair  and  tender  growths  of  spiritual  aspira- 
tion faint  and  fade  in  it.  Moreover,  practical 
considerations  count  for  much.  The  ministry 
of  a  settled  church  must  needs  take  the  character 
of  a  profession,  by  which  men  earn  their  living, 
and  which  they  embrace  with  that  legitimate  but 
unheroic  purpose.  Parents  and  guardians  have 
much  to  say  in  the  choice  of  profession  by  those 
for  whom  they  are  primarily  responsible.  Divine 
vocation,  the  indispensable  basis  of  valid  min- 
istry, reaches  many,  perhaps  most,  of  the  clergy 
of  Christendom  indirectly,  through  the  counsel 
of  relatives  and  the  leading  of  circumstances. 
It  is  manifest  that  the  view  of  parents  and  guar- 
dians will  be  determined  not  inconsiderably  by 
circumstances,  which  might  weU  be  ignored  by 


i8        THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

their  children.  What,  they  will  naturally  ask, 
are  the  worldly  prospects  of  a  Christian  minis- 
ter? What  probability  of  professional  success 
Hes  before  the  preacher,  and  what  are  the  rewards 
of  such  success  as  he  may  hope  to  attain?  Cer- 
tainly it  must  be  admitted  that  the  mundane 
conditions  of  the  ministry  do  not  improve.  The 
loss  of  social  and  poHtical  consequence  has  gone 
hand  in  hand  with  a  relative  diminution  of  in- 
come, and  the  worsening  process  does  not  appear 
to  have  reached  a  term.  A  clergyman's  income 
will  hardly  stand  comparison  with  that  of  any 
other  professional  man  equally  full  of  work,  and 
it  has  a  petty  aspect  beside  the  earnings  of  the 
successful  tradesman  or  merchant.  There  are 
few  prizes  which  ambition  can  aspire  after,  and 
these  are  ever  more  heavily  weighted  with  public 
responsibility.  These  facts  tell  directly  and 
potently  on  the  supply  of  candidates  for  ordina- 
tion. Parents  shrink  from  encouraging  their 
sons  to  enter  so  poorly  paid  a  profession,  and 
young  men  with  the  world  in  front  of  them  shirk 
from  committing  themselves  to  a  career  so  penuri- 
ous and  so  uninteresting.  In  so  far  as  the  difiEi- 
culty  of  recruiting  the  Christian  ministry  arises 
from  such  causes,  however,  it  need  not  concern 
us  here;  but  there  are  other  causes  which  have 
a  manifest  bearing  on  our  present  argument. 
Will  anyone  acquainted  with  the  circumstances 
of  the  modern  Church  deny  that  many,  and  they 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        19 

the  ablest  and  best  equipped,  are  arrested  on  the 
threshold  of  the  ministry  by  the  aspect  of  intel- 
lectual bondage  which  that  ministry  seems  to 
present?  Is  it  not  the  case  that  this  aspect  is 
most  repulsive  to  those  whose  intellectual  qual- 
ities are  finest,  and  whose  consciences  are  most 
sensitive  ?  Must  it  not  be  an  anxious  and  urgent 
question  for  the  churches  whether  they  are  not 
actually  themselves  the  responsible  causes  of 
their  own  gravest  embarrassment? 

Thus  from  the  saHent  facts  of  the  present  situ- 
ation the  necessity  for  action  clearly  emerges. 
If  the  educated  laity  are  not  to  be  wholly  alien- 
ated within  the  Protestant  sphere  (as  already 
appears  to  be  the  case  within  the  Roman  Cath- 
olic Church)  a  larger  "Liberty  of  Prophesying" 
must  be  conceded  to  the  preachers  whom  they 
are  required  to  accept  as  religious  teachers.  If 
the  Christian  ministry  is  to  attract  thoughtful 
and  self-respecting  men,  it  must  promise  a 
career  which  shall  not  humiliate  them  in  their 
own  eyes,  or  prohibit  to  them  the  most  important 
exercises  of  their  teaching  office. 

It  may,  perhaps,  be  here  objected  that  a  neces- 
sary practical  distinction  is  being  ignored  when 
so  much  freedom  is  demanded  for  preachers. 
Why  may  not  some  limits  be  set  to  the  public 
exercise  of  a  liberty  which  yet  is  not  refused? 
Liberty  of  thought  and  (within  certain  necessary 
and  reasonable  bounds)   liberty  of  speech  may 


20        THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

surely  be  conceded,  without  throwing  down  once 
and  for  all  the  barriers,  which  have  been  carefully 
erected  by  former  generations  against  the  risks 
and  scandals  of  unchecked  individualism  in  the 
pulpit.  The  function  of  the  preacher  must  be 
more  narrowly  conceived,  and  more  strictly  de- 
fined. The  paramount  consideration  for  the 
Church  is  not  the  satisfaction  of  his  conscience, 
but  the  spiritual  edification  of  the  people  to 
whom  he  is  sent  with  a  specific  work  to  perform. 
At  all  hazards  they  must  not  be  made  to  stumble 
by  his  conscientious  self-assertion.  Now  it  can- 
not of  course  be  denied  that  there  is  a  core  of 
reasonableness  in  such  an  argument  as  this, 
and,  albeit  variously  expressed,  it  is  certain 
that  it  commends  itself  very  widely  to  religious 
folk.  If,  however,  it  be  seriously  considered, 
we  shall  find  that  the  practical  bearing  of  the 
truth  it  contains  is  misconceived,  and  that  the 
whole  argument  presupposes  an  impossible  situ- 
ation. 

Consideration  for  the  needs,  and  even,  within 
limits,  for  the  preferences  of  the  congregation 
belongs  to  the  pastoral  duty  of  the  preacher,  not 
primarily  to  the  formal  regulation  of  his  office. 
The  suggestion  that  there  may  be  degrees  in  the 
liberty  permitted  to  the  Christian  preacher, 
greater  here,  less  there,  offends  against  the  plain- 
est verities  of  human  nature.  You  must  deal 
with  every  man  as  an  indivisible  imit;  if  you  con- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      21 

cede,  as  indeed  you  must  concede,  liberty  of 
thought,  you  cannot  reasonably  attempt  to  pro- 
hibit liberty  of  speech.  The  indispensable  as- 
sumption of  the  last  prohibition  is  the  Tightness 
in  principle  of  the  first.  A  Christian  minister 
may  fairly  be  prohibited  from  preaching  agnos- 
ticism or  free  love  because  it  cannot  be  supposed 
that,  even  in  the  recesses  of  his  own  thought,  he 
could  be  either  an  agnostic  or  an  antinomian. 
The  postulate  of  all  subscription  must  be  the 
correspondence  of  thought  and  speech.  Accord- 
ingly, if  you  tolerate  liberty  of  speech  anywhere, 
you  must  tolerate  it  everywhere.  There  must 
not  be  one  measure  of  liberty  for  the  lecture  hall 
and  the  theological  treatise,  and  another  for  the 
pulpit  and  the  parish  magazine,  however  widely 
the  specific  exercise  of  liberty  may,  and  indeed 
must,  vary.  In  guarding  against  public  scandal 
you  must  take  care  that  you  do  no  injury  to  pri- 
vate honour,  for  if  once  you  wound  private  hon- 
our you  will  have  opened  the  door  to  the  worst 
of  all  public  scandals.  Moreover,  if  you  con- 
ceive yourself  bound  to  make  the  attempt  in  the 
interest  of  the  congregations,  you  will  be  greatly 
deceived,  for  the  congregations  also  have  moved 
far  from  the  old  moorings  of  traditional  ortho- 
doxy, and  they  will  not  long  acquiesce  in  any 
treatment  which  ignores  the  fact.  Of  all  the 
fatuous  performances  of  Charles  I's  govern- 
ment, none  was  at  the  time  more  exasperating, 


22        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

and  none  seems  to  us  more  futile,  than  the  attempt 
to  pacify  the  distracted  Church  of  England  by 
prohibiting  the  preachers  from  handling  subjects 
of  controversy  in  the  pulpit.  The  mere  attempt 
to  make  peace  by  the  edict  of  authority  indicated 
the  absence  of  any  adequate  recognition,  either 
of  the  importance  of  truth  in  the  eyes  of  serious 
men,  or  of  the  imperative  nature  of  religious 
conviction.  "  Out  of  the  abundance  of  the  heart 
the  mouth  speaketh,"  says  the  Gospel,  and  there- 
fore it  is  equally  unjust  and  unavailing  to  re- 
strain the  utterance  of  beliefs  which  you  must 
perforce  allow  to  be  tolerable.  We  shall  have 
occasion  to  point  out  in  the  course  of  these  lec- 
tures, that  the  nature  of  modern  objections  to 
traditional  statements  of  doctrine  does  not  really 
allow  of  their  concealment  by  the  preacher  who 
admits  them.  Not  to  acknowledge  them  in  the 
process  of  preaching  is  implicitly  to  disallow 
them:  there  is  no  middle  way  of  calculated  and 
conscientious  silence  open  to  an  honest  man. 
"Suppressio  veri"  implies  also  and  inevitably 
"suggestio  falsi."  Here  also  the  law  holds:  "Ye 
cannot  serve  God  and  Mammon." 

In  these  lectures,  therefore,  the  term  "Preach- 
ing" will  receive  the  widest  possible  extension. 
It  includes  every  method  of  official  utterance, 
and  covers  the  whole  area  of  the  preacher's  min- 
istry. In  the  pulpit,  manifestly,  his  deepest 
convictions  ought  to  find  expression,  for  there 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        23 

he  speaks  with  the  full  authority  of  his  sacred 
office,  and  presumably  with  careful  previous 
consideration  of  his  words.  As  it  is  unjust  to 
impose  unwarrantable  limits  on  his  "Liberty  of 
Prophesying"  in  sermons,  so  it  is  unreasonable 
to  release  him  from  the  fullest  burden  of  personal 
responsibility  for  what  he  thus  delivers.  No 
apology  for  doctrinal  error  seems  to  be  more 
truly  irrelevant  than  that  which  pleads  the  cir- 
cumstance of  preaching  as  an  excuse  for  careless 
or  ignorant  utterance.  The  accused  preacher 
may  fairly  demand  that  the  tenor  of  his  doctrine 
shall  not  be  deduced  from  a  single  sermon:  that 
due  allowance  shall  be  made  for  the  emotional 
or  rhetorical  element  which  may  be  permissible 
in  any  sermon:  that  his  characteristic  modes  of 
argument  and  forms  of  expression  shall  be  con- 
sidered and  appreciated:  that  the  correlation 
and  balance  of  truths  in  his  scheme  of  preaching 
shall  be  recognized  and  allowed  for,  but  he  may 
not  ask  that  a  lower  standard  of  knowledge  and 
accuracy  should  be  applied  to  the  public  exer- 
cise of  his  sacred  ministry  than  would  properly 
be  applied  to  any  private  and  unofficial  utter- 
ance to  his  thought.  On  this  point  it  is  impos- 
sible to  be  too  insistent.  Every  step  towards 
the  complete  enfranchisement  of  the  Christian 
preacher  ought  to  be  conditioned  by  the  accept- 
ance on  the  part  of  the  preacher  himself  of  a 
more  rigorous  standard  of  responsibility  in  preach- 


24        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

ing,  and  a  severer  rule  of  self-criticism.  Assuredly, 
if  careless,  or  uninformed,  or  exaggerated,  or  mis- 
leading language  be  ever  reprehensible  on  the 
lips  of  the  ordained  teacher,  most  of  all  must  this 
be  the  case  when  the  words  which  are  passing  on 
those  lips  are  public  and  official,  spoken  with 
solemn  invocation  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  accom- 
panied by  acts  of  common  worship.  In  these  cir- 
cumstances of  Christian  preaching,  perhaps,  will 
be  found  the  most  effectual  securities  against  the 
abuse  of  the  preacher's  "Liberty  of  Prophesying." 

In  adopting  the  title  of  Jeremy  Taylor's 
famous  treatise,  you  may  perhaps  fairly  ask  from 
me  some  words  of  explanation.  You  will,  in- 
deed, have  already  observed  that  the  title  is 
adapted  as  well  as  adopted.  I  propose  to  con- 
sider "The  Liberty  of  Prophesying  with  its  just 
limits  and  temper"  with  a  twofold  restriction  of 
reference,  viz.,  that  which  is  implicit  in  the  pre- 
scribed subject  of  the  Lyman  Beecher  lecture, 
and  that  which  is  stated  in  my  adapted  title.  I 
am  concerned  with  the  case  of  the  Christian 
preacher,  and  with  the  circumstances  of  the 
modern  Church. 

Jeremy  Taylor's  discourse  was  designed  to 
show  "the  unreasonableness  of  prescribing  to 
other  men's  faith,  and  the  iniquity  of  persecuting 
differing  opinions."  He  wrote  as  one  of  a  per- 
secuted minority,  and  it  is  not  difficult  to  trace 
in  his  argument  the  influence  of  his  fortunes. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        25 

His  treatise  is  rather  an  eloquent  plea  for  a  right 
sense  of  proportion  in  religion  than  for  tolera- 
tion, though  his  actual  proposition  to  tolerate  all 
Christians  who  would  subscribe  the  Apostles' 
Creed  went  so  far  beyond  the  charity  of  his  con- 
temporaries, that  they  regarded  his  work  with 
disapprobation  and  alarm  as  dangerously  latitu- 
dinarian.  Nor  was  he  himself  consistent,  for 
when  the  wheel  of  changing  fortune  had  set  him 
in  the  seat  of  authority,  and  thus  placed  in  his 
hands  the  opportunity  of  putting  his  generous 
precepts  into  practice,  he  does  not  appear  to 
have  exhibited  any  greater  tolerance  than  that 
of  the  other  Restoration  bishops,  and  rather  less 
than  some.  His  theory  has  reached  us  without 
the  recommendation  of  his  example.  In  spite 
of  all,  however,  the  "Liberty  of  Prophesying" 
will  always  merit  the  study  of  thoughtful  men, 
and  hold  an  important  place  in  the  literary  treas- 
ure of  the  English-speaking  churches.  It  is 
full  of  luminous  wisdom,  and  varied  learning, 
and  exalted  eloquence,  and  it  is  a  repertory  of 
keen  analysis  and  fehcitous  argument,  and  re- 
morseless criticism.  Moreover,  though  Jeremy 
Taylor  himself  restricted  unduly  the  applica- 
tion of  his  arguments,  the  arguments  themselves 
remain,  and  justify  larger  consequences  than  he 
imagined.  The  Epistle  Dedicatory  addressed  to 
Lord  Hatton  requires  but  little  modification  to 
make  it  relevant  to  the  situation  with  which  we 


26       THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

are  familiar.  It  would,  for  instance,  be  difficult 
to  improve  on  the  following  statement  of  the 
intolerant  temper  with  which  we  also  have  to 
contend:  "The  fault  I  find,  and  seek  to  remedy, 
is,  that  men  are  so  dogmatical  and  resolute  in 
their  opinions,  and  impatient  of  others  disagree- 
ing, in  those  things  wherein  is  no  sufficient  means 
of  union  and  determination;  but  that  men  should 
let  opinions  and  problems  keep  their  own  forms, 
and  not  be  obtruded  as  axioms,  nor  questions 
in  the  vast  collection  of  the  system  of  divinity  be 
adopted  into  the  family  of  faith." 

Would  it  be  possible  to  state  the  case  against 
clerical  subscription  more  effectively  than  in  these 
words  ?  — 

"This  discourse  is  so  far  from  giving  leave  to 
men  to  profess  anything,  though  they  believe  the 
contrary,  that  it  takes  order  that  no  man  shall 
be  put  to  it:  for  I  earnestly  contend  that  another 
man's  opinion  shall  be  no  rule  to  mine,  and  that 
my  opinion  shall  be  no  snare  and  prejudice  to 
myself;  that  men  use  one  another  so  charitably 
and  so  gently,  that  no  error  or  violence  tempt  men 
to  hypocrisy:  this  very  thing  being  one  of  the 
arguments  I  use  to  persuade  permissions,  lest 
compulsion  introduce  hypocrisy,  and  make  sin- 
cerity troublesome  and  unsafe." 

Two  hundred  and  fifty  years  have  greatly 
strengthened  his  appeal  to  human  experience  in 
the  interest  of  religious  toleration:  and  the  pro- 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING         27 

gress  of  historical  studies  has  added  force  to  his 
argument  that,  since  the  churches  have  contin- 
ually changed  their  doctrines,  it  is  probable  that 
complete  and  unadulterated  truth  belongs  to 
none  of  them: 

"  And  then,  if  we  look  abroad,  and  consider  how 
there  is  scarce  any  church  but  is  highly  charged  by 
many  adversaries  in  many  things,  possibly  we  may 
see  a  reason  to  charge  every  one  of  them,  in  some 
things;  and  what  shall  we  do  then?  The  Church 
of  Rome  hath  spots  enough,  and  all  the  world  is  in- 
quisitive enough  to  find  out  more,  and  to  represent 
these  to  her  greatest  disadvantage.  The  Greek 
churches  deny  the  procession  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
from  the  Son.  If  that  be  false  doctrine,  she  is 
highly  to  blame;  if  it  be  not,  then  all  the  western 
churches  are  to  blame  for  saying  the  contrary. 
And  there  is  no  church  that  is  in  prosperity,  but 
alters  her  doctrine  every  age,  either  by  bringing 
in  new  doctrines,  or  by  contradicting  her  old; 
which  shews  that  none  are  satisfied  with  them- 
selves, or  with  their  own  confessions.  And  since 
all  churches  believe  themselves  fallible,  that  only 
excepted  which  all  other  churches  say  is  most 
of  all  deceived,  —  it  were  strange  if,  in  so  many 
articles,  which  make  up  their  several  bodies  of 
confessions,  they  had  not  mistaken,  every  one 
of  them,  in  some  thing  or  other.  The  Lutheran 
churches  maintain  consubstantiation,  the  Zuin- 
glians  are  sacramentaries,  the  Calvinists  are  fierce 


28        THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

in  the  matters  of  absolute  predetermination, 
and  all  these  reject  episcopacy;  which  the  prim- 
itive church  made  no  doubt  to  have  called 
heresy.  The  Socinians  profess  a  portentous  num- 
ber of  strange  opinions;  they  deny  the  Holy 
Trinity,  and  the  satisfaction  of  our  Blessed 
Saviour.  The  Anabaptists  laugh  at  Pasdo- 
baptism:  the  Ethiopian  churches  are  Nestorian. 
Where,  then,  shall  we  fix  our  confidence,  or  join 
communion?  To  pitch  upon  any  one  of  these 
is  to  throw  the  dice,  if  salvation  be  to  be  had 
only  in  one  of  them,  and  that  every  error  that  by 
chance  hath  made  a  sect,  and  is  distinguished  by 
a  name,  be  damnable." 

The  most  recent  experience  does  but  illustrate 
his  contention  that  the  favourite  ecclesiastical 
policy  of  official  suppression  and  disingenuous 
handHng  of  books  defeats  itself,  and  implies  a 
humiliating  confession  of  self-distrust.  Might 
not  the  Modernists  imagine  that  their  own  situ- 
tion  had  inspired  the  following  passage? 

"Of  the  same  consideration  is  mending  of 
authors,  not  to  their  own  mind,  but  to  ours,  that  is, 
to  mend  them  so  as  to  spoil  them;  forbidding  the 
publication  of  books  in  which  there  is  nothing 
impious  or  against  the  public  interest,  leaving 
out  clauses  in  translations,  disgracing  men's 
persons,  charging  disavowed  doctrines  upon 
men,  and  the  persons  of  the  men  with  the  con- 
sequents   of    their    doctrine,    which    they    deny 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING         29 

either  to  be  true  or  to  be  consequent;  false  report- 
ing of  disputations  and  conferences,  burning 
books  by  the  hand  of  the  hangman,  and  all  such 
arts,  which  show  that  we  either  distrust  God 
for  the  maintenance  of  His  truth,  or  distrust  our- 
selves and  our  abilities.  .  .  . 

"  It  is  but  an  illiterate  policy  to  think  that  such 
indirect  and  uningenuous  proceedings  can,  among 
wise  and  free  men,  disgrace  the  authors,  and 
disrepute  their  discourses.  And  I  have  seen 
that  the  price  hath  been  trebled  upon  a  forbidden 
or  condemned  book;  and  some  men  in  policy 
have  got  a  prohibition  that  their  impression 
might  be  the  more  certainly  vendible,  and  the 
author  himself  thought  considerable." 

Finally,  might  not  all  Christians  still  ponder 
with  advantage  his  insistence  on  the  supreme 
importance  of  moral  rightness,  and  the  relative 
pettiness  of  intellectual  error?  Can  any  con- 
troversialist afford  to  forget  his  warning  against 
the  blinding  tendency  of  unbalanced  zeal? 

"To  my  understanding,  it  is  a  plain  art  and 
design  of  the  devil,  to  make  us  so  in  love  with 
our  own  opinions  as  to  call  them  faith  and  relig- 
ion, that  we  may  be  proud  in  our  understand- 
ing: and  besides  that,  by  our  zeal  in  our  opinions, 
we  grow  cool  in  our  piety  and  practical  duties; 
he  also  by  this  earnest  contention  does  directly 
destroy  good  life,  by  engagement  of  zealots  to 
do  anything  rather  than  be  overcome,  and  lose 


30        THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

their  beloved  propositions.  But  I  would  fain 
know,  why  is  not  any  vicious  habit  as  bad  or 
worse  than  a  false  opinion?  Why  are  we  so 
zealous  against  those  we  call  heretics,  and  yet 
great  friends  with  drunkards,  fornicators,  and 
swearers,  and  intemperate  and  idle  persons?  I 
am  certain  that  a  drunkard  is  as  contrary  to 
God,  and  lives  as  contrary  to  the  laws  of  Chris- 
tianity, as  a  heretic;  and  I  am  also  sure  that  I 
know  what  drunkenness  is:  but  I  am  not  sure 
that  such  an  opinion  is  heresy:  neither  would 
other  men  be  so  sure  as  they  think  for,  if  they  did 
consider  it  aright,  and  observe  the  infinite  decep- 
tions and  causes  of  deceptions  in  wise  men,  and 
in  most  things,  and  in  all  doubtful  questions, 
and  that  they  did  not  mistake  confidence  for 
certainty." 


II 


OF   DENOMINATIONAL  SUBSCRIPTIONS 

The  preacher  is  the  officer  of  a  church,  not 
only  of  the  Church  or  Society  of  Believers,  but 
also  of  a  separately  organized  section  of  it.  His 
membership  may  be  matter  of  course,  as  it  com- 
monly is  with  the  preachers  of  the  National 
Churches,  or  it  may  have  been  determined  by 
his  own  deliberate  choice,  but  it  is  a  fact  with 
which  he  must  reckon.  He  has  to  make  his 
count  with  the  claim  which  his  church  or  de- 
nomination prefers,  to  stake  out  for  him  the  limits 
of  doctrinal  liberty,  and  to  prescribe,  in  advance  of 
his  thinking,  and  we  must  add  in  advance  also 
of  his  knowledge,  the  lines  of  his  religious  thought. 
The  case  of  the  churchless  or  undenominational 
preacher  need  not  detain  us,  for  in  so  far  as  it  is 
legitimate  at  all,  it  must  be  supposed  to  belong 
to  the  category  of  extraordinary  ministries,  which 
find  their  conditions  of  exercise  where  they  found 
their  original  commission,  in  the  direct  inspira- 
tion of  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  offer  the  sufficient 
credentials  of  authority  in  their  results.  Most 
commonly  the  "free  lance"  of  modern  experi- 
31 


32        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

ence  is  either  a  mere  adventurer,  who  takes  his 
directions  from  his  observations  of  the  popular 
taste  in  doctrine,  or  a  half-educated  enthusiast, 
v^ho  seeks  no  guidance  other  than  his  own  per- 
ception of  truth,  and  tolerates  no  authority  be- 
side that  of  his  own  zeal.  From  the  start  of 
Christianity,  the  preacher  has  commonly  been 
an  ordained  minister,  and  as  such  has  been  held 
to  utter  the  general  belief  of  the  Church.  At  no 
time  has  it  been  tolerated  that  he  should  claim 
the  right  to  make  innovations  in  the  doctrinal 
tradition  of  the  Church  whose  officer  he  is.  Even 
the  "charismatic"  ministries  of  the  first  ages 
were  subject  to  testing  by  the  Church,  and 
"sound  doctrine"  was  ever  an  indispensable 
evidence  of  genuine  inspiration.  So  long  as  the 
external  unity  of  the  Church  was  maintained, 
it  was  comparatively  easy  to  identify  "heresy" 
by  formal  marks,  and  to  deal  summarily  with 
convicted  heretics.  There  could  be  no  question 
of  any  claim  on  the  part  of  preachers  to  con- 
struct their  own  creeds,  or  to  criticise  the  official 
credenda;  but  when,  as  a  result  of  the  Refor- 
mation, external  unity  was  destroyed,  a  wholly 
new  condition,  at  once  favourable  and  unfavour- 
able to  the  preacher's  doctrinal  liberty,  came  into 
existence.  The  weakening  of  ecclesiastical  au- 
thority by  the  disruption  of  the  mediaeval  Church 
was  itself  eminently  favourable  to  intellectual, 
and  therein  also  to  theological  liberty,  but  the 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING        33 

conditions  of  the  new  situation  were  not  in  some 
important  respects  favourable  to  the  preacher's 
doctrinal  independence.  The  separated  churches 
had  perforce  to  settle  their  constitutions,  and  to 
frame  their  apologies.  The  first  was  a  necessity 
for  themselves;  the  last  was  an  ©bligation  to  the 
rest  of  the  Christian  world,  but,  however  legiti- 
mate, and,  indeed,  indispensable,  denominational 
"confessions"  may  have  been,  they  had  the  re- 
grettable result  of  adding  to  the  properly  religious 
requirements  of  the  preacher's  office  a  series  of 
lower  demands,  dictated  as  much  by  the  political 
circumstances  as  by  the  distinctive  beliefs  of  the 
newly  organized  churches.  As  denominations 
multipHed,  confessions  lengthened^  because  they 
aspired  to  more  precise  and  detailed  distinctive- 
ness of  religious  attitude.  First  the  National 
Churches;  then  the  international  unions  of 
National  Churches;  finally,  the  non-National 
Churches  formed  by  separation  on  some  specific 
doctrinal  or  disciplinary  principle  —  all  in  suc- 
cession set  forth  statements  of  doctrine,  and  pro- 
ceeded to  exact  from  their  ministers  subscriptions 
to  those  statements.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that, 
throughout  the  whole  area  of  the  Reformation, 
preaching  was  exalted  as  the  principal  function 
of  the  Christian  ministry.  The  doctrinal  sound- 
ness of  the  preacher  became  an  object  of  the  first 
importance.  Everywhere,  perhaps  inevitably,  the 
object  was  pursued  by  the  same  method,  viz.,  the 


34        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

exacting  of  subscriptions  of  assent  to  the  estab- 
lished confessions  of  denominational  belief. 

It  is  certainly  true  that,  at  first,  no  distinction 
in  principle  was  drawn,  or  intended  to  be  drawn, 
between  the  case  of  the  minister  and  that  of  the 
lay  member  of  the  church.  The  doctrines  set 
forth  in  the  denominational  confession  were  held 
to  be  necessary  for  both,  and  were  insisted  upon 
with  a  grotesque  assumption  of  religious  certi- 
tude, but  in  practice  a  distinction  quickly  grew 
up  between  them,  for,  while  subscription  was 
invariably  and  publicly  exacted  from  ministers, 
it  was  rarely  demanded  from  laymen.  Inevitably 
the  former  appeared  to  be  more  strictly  controlled 
in  their  religious  thinking  than  the  latter,  and 
the  profoundly  irrational,  and  not  less  profoundly 
mischievous,  notion  of  two  Hsts  of  Christian 
credenda,  the  one  long  for  the  ministry,  the  other 
short  for  the  laity,  took  root  in  the  popular  mind, 
and  finally  established  itself  as  an  assumption 
of  popular  religious  discussions. 

When  we  inquire  what  may  be  the  degree  of 
obligation  which  an  honest  conscience  must  recog- 
nize in  the  formal  subscriptions  of  the  modern 
preacher,  two  general  considerations  may  be 
advanced  as  fairly  relevant  to  the  case  of  all  the 
Protestant  confessions.  First,  these  confessions 
must  always  be  regarded  in  the  light  of  that 
explicit  repudiation  of  ecclesiastical  infallibility, 
which  is  vital  to  Protestantism  in  all  its  forms. 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING         35 

Next,  they  must  be  looked  upon  as  the  doctrinal 
deliverances  of  the  modern  churches,  not  as 
mere  echoes  from  some  previous  age. 

When  the  Thirty-nine  Articles  declare  that 
General  Councils  are  not  infallible,  it  cannot  be 
thought  that  the  English  Convocation  possesses 
any  superior  quality  which  should  clothe  its 
decisions  with  perpetual  validity.  Similarly,  when 
the  Westminster  Confession  afhrms  that  "all 
synods  and  councils  since  the  Apostles'  times, 
whether  general  or  particular,  may  err  and  many 
have  erred,"  it  clearly  disallows  in  advance  the 
claim  that  the  decisions  of  the  Assembly  of  Divines 
are  unalterable,  or  that  the  General  Assembly  of 
1647,  which  approved  them,  was  an  exception 
to  the  rule  of  fallibility.  Indeed  the  Confession 
draws  the  obvious  inference  when  it  declares 
that  such  synods  and  councils,  i.e.,  presumably 
their  doctrinal  decisions,  "are  not  to  be  made 
the  rule  of  faith  or  practice,  but  to  be  used  as  an 
help  in  both."  It  follows  that  those  Anglican 
and  Presbyterian  preachers  who  find  the  official 
formularies  of  their  respective  churches  unsatis- 
fying and  even  unhelpful  are  entitled  to  claim 
that,  on  the  recognized  principles  of  Protestantism 
confessed  in  the  formularies  themselves,  no  ter- 
restrial authority  exists,  or  ever  has  existed,  com- 
petent to  provide  doctrinal  decisions  which  shall 
be  securely  guaranteed  against  inadequacy,  and 
that  when  they  in  their  turn  seek  for  an  official 


36       THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

recognition  of  the  defects  which  they  perceive 
in  existing  formularies,  they  are  but  following 
the  example  of  the  Reformers  themselves,  those 
courageous  innovators  to  whom  under  God  they 
owe  the  very  existence  of  Protestant  Christianity. 
Moreover,  there  is  both  piety  and  good  sense  in 
Newman's  contention  in  the  famous  Tract  XC, 
and,  if  we  substitute  the  Scriptural  term  "  Chris- 
tian" for  the  unhappily  ambiguous  term  "catho- 
lic," we  may  conveniently  adopt  his  own  words 
as  our  own:  "It  is  a  duty  which  we  owe  both 
to  the  Catholic  Church  and  to  our  own,  to  take 
our  reformed  Confessions  in  the  most  catholic 
sense  they  will  admit;  we  have  no  duties  towards 
their  framers."  The  preacher's  duty  is  to  the 
church  which  commissions  him,  and  to  the  people 
to  whom  he  is  commissioned,  and  neither  duty  can 
be  separated  from  the  primary  and  indefeasible 
obligation  which  he  owes  to  his  own  conscience. 
Only  in  so  far  as  the  official  denominational 
formulary  utters  the  intention  and  sets  forth  the 
faith  of  the  present  Church  does  it  answer  to 
the  primary  purpose  of  such  a  formulary.  No 
church  has  any  interest  in  exacting  irrelevant 
subscriptions,  and  subscriptions  to  propositions 
which  have  ceased  to  be  living  beliefs  are  as 
irrelevant  to  any  spiritual  interest  as  the  ob- 
solete dogmata  of  alchemists  and  astrologers. 
Nor  is  it  wholly  impracticable  to  attempt  the 
provision    of    certain    tests   by   which  the   rele- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        37 

vancy  of  an  ancient  doctrinal  confession  can  be 
appraised. 

Thus,  in  the  first  place,  due  allowance  must 
be  made  for  the  fact  that  the  denominational 
formularies  of  Protestantism  have  in  no  slight 
measure  the  character  of  emergency-documents, 
that  is,  documents  composed  with  reference  to 
the  necessities  of  specific  historic  situations. 
These  determining  necessities,  however,  have 
largely  disappeared,  or  fallen  into  comparative 
insignificance,  and,  in  so  far  as  this  is  the  case, 
it  may  fairly  be  maintained  that  the  Confessions 
themselves  have  become  obsolete,  and  cannot  be 
supposed  to  have  more  than  an  historical  inter- 
est. The  preacher  of  to-day  can  hardly  be  held 
to  an  ex  animo  acceptance  of  doctrinal  pronounce- 
ments which  were  dictated  by,  and  must  find 
their  justifications  in  connection  with,  the  political 
exigencies  of  his  church  in  the  sixteenth  or  seven- 
teenth centuries.  He  may,  indeed,  by  an  effort 
of  the  historical  imagination  transport  himself 
into  the  past,  and  there  give  an  unquaHfied 
approval  to  the  action  of  his  religious  ancestors, 
but  this  is  something  quite  distinct  from  con- 
tinuing to  give  such  approval  when  the  circum- 
stances which  made  it  possible  have  faded  from 
mind  and  cannot  be  renewed. 

In  the  next  place,  the  doctrinal  decisions  of  the 
past  must  be  read  in  connection  with  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  time.     That  may  be  a  just  decision 


38        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

in  view  of  one  state  of  knowledge  which  becomes 
wholly  the  contrary  in  view  of  another.  All  judg- 
ments must  be  related  to  the  evidence  on  which 
they  were  based;  it  argues  no  imputation  on  the 
soundness  of  any  judgment  to  say  that  it  would 
have  been  different  if  other  evidence  had  been 
available,  nor  does  a  final  court  refuse  to  revise 
verdicts  if  it  can  be  shown  that  new  light  is  acces- 
sible which  compels  revision  in  the  primary 
interest  of  justice.  The  principles  of  judgment 
remain  unaltered  by  the  change  in  the  manner  of 
their  application.  In  the  case  of  denominational 
formularies  framed  in  a  distant  age,  this  distinc- 
tion between  principles  and  their  specific  appli- 
cations is  equally  reasonable  and  important.  We 
may  adhere  to  the  first  while  we  reject  the  last; 
nay,  a  sincere  and  intelligent  acceptance  of  the 
one  may  compel  in  the  circumstances  a  rejection 
of  the  other.  The  validity  of  any  application  of 
a  principle  lies  in  the  assurance  that  all  the  relevant 
circumstances  have  been  considered.  In  so  far 
as  the  formularies  consist  of  applications  of  prin- 
ciple, they  lie  open  to  the  objection  that  the  relevant 
circumstances  are  continually  changing,  and  that 
consequently  they  are  increasingly  inadequate. 
Truth  is  indeed  unchanging,  but  it  is  never  seen 
in  the  same  perspectives,  so  that  its  aspect  is 
never  precisely  the  same.  Doctrinal  definitions 
are  attempts  to  give  permanence  to  the  specific 
aspects  of  religious  truth  which  present  them- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        39 

selves  at  a  given  juncture;  they  begin  to  grow 
inadequate  from  the  moment  of  their  drafting. 
In  effect,  denominational  Confessions  must  be 
subjected  to  a  careful  process  of  historical  trans- 
lation before  their  precise  doctrinal  authority  at 
any  given  time  can  be  ascertained.  To  stereo- 
type, and  clothe  with  sacred  obhgation,  the  de- 
cisions which  uttered  the  opinions  of  the  sixteenth 
or  seventeenth  centuries,  would  be  a  proceeding 
very  irrational  and  unfortunate.  It  cannot  be 
seriously  maintained,  that  the  patent  unreason  and 
impohcy  of  such  an  understanding  of  subscrip- 
tion is  irrelevant  to  the  practical  question  before 
us. 

Thirdly,  these  Confessions  must  not  be  sup- 
posed to  have  any  direct  reference  to  subjects 
which  have  emerged  since  the  time  of  their  com- 
position. It  may,  indeed,  fairly  be  argued  that 
new  questions  ought  to  be  answered  on  the  prin- 
ciples already  accepted  by  the  Church,  and  this 
may  be  admitted  if  due  allowance  be  made 
for  the  new  conditions  of  circumstance  and 
knowledge. 

Thus  the  subscription  of  the  preacher  to  his 
denominational  formulary  must  take  account  of 
its  obsoleteness,  of  its  irrelevance,  and  of  its 
silence.  These  considerations,  if  frankly  ad- 
mitted, will  be  found  to  remove  most,  if  not  all, 
the  difficulties  commonly  expressed  with  respect 
to  denominational  subscriptions.     It  must  not, 


40        THE    LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

however,  be  forgotten  that  the  embarrassments 
to  which  the  formularies  reduce  those  who  sign 
them,  are  but  a  small  part  of  the  total  mischief 
which  may  be  ascribed  to  them.  Even  more 
important  are  the  indirect  effects  which  flow  from 
the  parade  of  lengthy  doctrinal  confessions, 
which  nobody  fully  beheves,  and  everybody 
explains  more  or  less  non-naturally,  as  the  pre- 
liminary condition  of  ministerial  office.  Ingenu- 
ous and  devout  young  men  are  made  to  stumble 
on  the  threshold  of  the  sanctuary.  The  door 
which  may  not  admit  such  opens  easily  to  the 
flippant,  the  shallow,  and  the  insincere.  "If  I 
subscribe,  I  subscribe  my  own  damnation,"  wrote 
Chillingworth  to  Sheldon,  when  the  neces- 
sity of  subscribing  the  Thirty-nine  Articles  was 
pressed  on  him,  and  though  his  scruples  were 
overcome  and  he  finally  accepted  the  necessity 
of  subscription,  his  words  continue  to  command 
a  larger  approval  than  his  example.  If  the  par- 
ticular points  on  which  his  conscience  revolted 
most  decisively  against  the  statements  of  the 
official  formularies,  the  obligation  of  the  fourth 
Commandment  on  Christians,  and  the  acceptance 
of  the  Athanasian  Creed  as  truly  Scriptural,  do 
not  appear  to  many  modern  Anghcans  to  be  very 
formidable,  the  reason  may  well  lie  in  the  long 
course  of  minimizing  sophistry  which  they  have 
experienced.  On  young  men  still,  as  then  on 
Chillingworth,  the  burden  of  indefensible  dog- 


THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING        41 

matic  statements  falls  heavily,  and  none  can  know 
anything  of  modern  life  without  being  aware  of 
the  fact.  Men  who  are  eminently  quaHfied  by 
character,  training,  and  abiHty  for  the  Christian 
ministry  are  excluded  from  its  ranks  by  the  lengthy 
and  largely  irrelevant  formularies  which  the 
Episcopahan  and  Presbyterian  churches  require 
them  to  subscribe  with  whatever  laxity  of  mean- 
ing. Nor  is  even  this  the  whole  extent  of  the 
mischief.  The  credit  of  the  Christian  ministry 
is  lowered  by  the  apparent  and  admitted  dis- 
crepancy between  the  convictions  and  doctrine  of 
preachers,  and  the  professions  which  they  have 
solemnly  and  pubHcly  made.  Even  when  the 
preacher  can  justify  subscription  to  his  own  con- 
science, as  indeed  I  think  he  can  on  a  suppo- 
sition which  I  will  state  immediately,  he  cannot 
make  his  situation  clear  to  the  public,  but  must 
fall  under  the  unexpressed  but  emphatic  censure 
of  the  very  persons  to  whom  he  is  religiously 
commissioned. 

The  supposition  on  which  self-respect  can  be 
reconciled  with  subscription  is  a  continuous  and 
genuine  effort  to  revise  or  remove  formularies 
which  are  seriously  open  to  objection.  Subscrip- 
tion under  protest  is  the  actual  situation,  and  the 
protest  becomes  morally  respectable  only  if  fol- 
lowed up  by  honest  effort  to  effect  the  requisite 
reformation. 

That  the  doctrinal  Confessions  of  the  sixteenth 


42  THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

and  seventeenth  centuries  are  from  every  point 
of  view  ill-suited  to  the  needs  of  the  churches 
which  have  inherited,  and  still  enforce  them,  is 
almost  universally  admitted  within  the  churches 
themselves,  and  from  time  to  time  efforts  have 
been  made  to  provide  some  relief  to  the  con- 
sciences of  those  who  have  subscribed,  or  are 
called  upon  to  subscribe  them.  The  relief  ac- 
tually provided,  however,  appears  to  be  inade- 
quate, and  expresses  rather  the  consciousness  of 
difficulty  than  any  clear  view  of  its  nature  or 
extent.  An  obstacle  to  any  effectual  action  is 
certainly  involved  in  the  fact  that  the  authors  of 
whatsoever  relief  can  be  obtained  have  themselves 
subscribed  the  objectionable  formularies,  and  are 
in  a  sense  pledged  to  their  defence  and  mainte- 
nance. Experience  has  proved  the  extraordinary 
strength  of  a  sentiment,  which  invests  official  sub- 
scription with  solemn  moral  significance,  even  in 
the  teeth  of  the  plainest  indications  that  it  is,  and  is 
regarded  as  being,  merely  conventional.  A  sense 
of  personal  obligation  lingers  in  the  mind  long 
after  all  serious  belief  in  the  specific  doctrines 
has  perished;  and  good  men  are  entangled  in 
casuistic  perplexities,  which  too  often  conceal 
from  them  the  true  character  of  their  own 
conduct,  and  even  dissipate  the  natural  sense 
of  words.  The  notion  of  revising  the  existing 
formularies,  or  of  providing  new  ones  to  replace 
them,  appears  to  command  little  support  in  any 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING        43 

quarter.  Thoughtful  men  cannot  but  perceive 
that,  even  if  such  a  course  w^ere  practicable,  the 
provision  of  a  new  or  revised  formulary  could 
not  but  induce  a  repetition  of  the  old  difficulty 
after  a  longer  or  shorter  interval  of  time,  and 
would  in  any  case  fail  to  secure  universal  approval. 
It  is,  moreover,  widely  felt  that  the  present  time 
is  peculiarly  unfavourable  for  any  theological 
reconstruction  of  an  authoritative  kind.  In 
many  important  respects  the  age  is  transitional, 
calling  rather  for  large  tolerance  of  anomalies 
than  for  precise  and  binding  regulation. 

While,  therefore,  the  historic  Confessions  have 
been  preserved  intact,  attention  has  been  devoted 
to  the  provision  of  a  form  of  subscription  which 
shall  be  compatible  with  considerable  divergence 
of  personal  belief,  and  allow  the  largest  latitude 
of  interpretation.  Thus  in  the  year  1865,  the 
Clerical  Subscription  Act  brought  considerable 
rehef  to  the  clergy  of  the  Church  of  England,  by 
substituting  for  the  rigorous  grammatical  assent 
and  consent  exacted  by  the  Caroline  Act  of  Uni- 
formity, a  form  expressed  in  quite  general  words. 
It  may  be  observed  that  the  Church  of  England 
has  never  held  any  very  exalted  doctrine  of  sub- 
scription. The  English  Reformation  was  in  the 
main  the  work  of  the  State,  and  this  circumstance 
imparted  to  the  system  of  the  Established  Church 
something  of  the  practical  expediency  which  is 
native  to  political  arrangements.     The  work  of 


44         THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

Henry  VIII  and  Elizabeth,  of  Charles  II  and 
William  III,  was  inspired  rather  by  political 
statecraft  than  by  personal  conviction  or  ecclesi- 
astical theory.  The  latter  motives  may  be  the 
more  respectable,  but  the  former  is  apt  to  be  the 
most  accommodating.  It  is  also  to  be  remem- 
bered that  the  Church  of  England,  in  spite  of  its 
theoretically  national  character,  failed  from  the 
very  start  of  its  history  as  a  reformed  and  inde- 
pendent church  to  secure  the  undivided  accept- 
ance of  the  nation,  and  was  always  confronted 
by  powerful  recalcitrant  minorities.  This  cir- 
cumstance has  tended  to  infuse  an  accommodating 
temper  into  the  ecclesiastical  administration,  so 
that  a  latitudinarian  tradition  has  generally  miti- 
gated the  legal  system,  and  gone  far  to  minimize 
the  religious  significance  of  doctrinal  subscrip- 
tion. Accordingly  the  yoke  has  been  heavier  in 
appearance  than  in  reality.  Nevertheless  the 
legal  subscriptions  have  been  and  are  still  widely 
resented,  and  the  more  sensitive  conscientious- 
ness of  modern  times  renders  the  old  anodynes 
less  and  less  effective. 

The  sixteenth  century  was  in  many  respects  a 
greater  age  than  the  seventeenth,  and  its  superi- 
ority is  exhibited  not  least  in  its  rehgious  for- 
mularies. These  deal  rather  with  large  prin- 
ciples than  with  dogmatic  schemes.  They  belong 
to  an  epoch  of  original  thinking,  not  to  one  of 
controversial   definition.     They   are  designed  as 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING        45 

the  platform  of  national  Christianity  rather  than 
as  the  basis  of  ecclesiastical  constitutions.  In  the 
seventeenth  century  controversy  prevailed:  the 
war  of  ideas  was  in  progress,  and  was  being  waged 
with  all  imaginable  ferocity.  Elaborate  theologi- 
cal systems  had  been  drafted,  and  claimed  from 
their  adherents  complete  and  exclusive  acceptance. 
Accordingly,  the  doctrinal  confessions  of  the  age 
were  detailed,  logical,  precise,  and  intolerant. 
The  contrast  between  the  sixteenth  and  the  seven- 
teenth centuries  is  well  indicated  by  that  be- 
tween the  Thirty-nine  Articles  of  1562  and  the 
Westminster  Confession  of  1647.  It  is  not  with- 
out interest  that  the  Assembly  of  Divines  had 
originally  designed  a  revision  of  the  English 
Confession,  and  actually  revised  the  first  fifteen 
Articles.  As  they  went  on  with  their  work  it 
became  apparent  that  the  doctrinal  system  of 
Calven,  and  the  presbyterian  polity  with  which 
it  was  associated,  were  not  easily  to  be  harmonized 
with  a  Confession  which  had  no  proper  connec- 
tion with  either;  and  in  the  sequel  a  wholly  new 
doctrinal  Confession  was  provided. 

The  Thirty-nine  Articles  have  never  taken 
high  rank  as  a  theological  formulary.  The 
apologists  of  the  English  Confession  have  mostly 
dwelt  on  the  skill  with  which  it  has  avoided  exact 
definitions,  and  its  competence  to  include  in  a 
single  church  representatives  of  the  most  diverse 
beliefs.     The    Westminster    Confession,    on    the 


46        THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

Other  hand,  has  been  most  praised  for  the  logical 
precision  and  all-embracing  character  of  its  theo- 
logical teaching.  It  may  be  described  as  the 
most  admired  and  the  most  resented  of  all  the 
doctrinal  confessions.  Its  comprehensive  and 
systematic  character  explains  both  the  admira- 
tion and  the  resentment.  Dr.  Hetherington, 
in  his  well-known  "History,"  may  be  taken  as 
an  excellent  representative  of  thorough-going 
admirers,  but  his  eulogistic  language  will  also 
serve  to  indicate  the  reasons  why  the  modern 
Presbyterian  finds  the  admired  document  so 
intolerable.  After  naming  the  leading  members 
of  the  Assembly,  he  proceeds  to  speak  of  their 
work  in  these  flattering  terms: 

"These  learned  and  able  divines  began  their 
labours  by  arranging,  in  the  most  systematic 
order,  the  various  great  and  sacred  truths  which 
God  has  revealed  to  man;  and  then  reduced  these 
to  thirty-two  distinct  heads  or  chapters.  These 
were  again  subdivided  into  sections;  and  the 
committee  formed  themselves  into  several  sub- 
committees, each  of  which  took  a  specific  topic, 
for  the  sake  of  exact  and  concentrated  delibera- 
tion. When  these  sub-committees  had  com- 
pleted their  respective  tasks,  the  whole  results 
were  laid  before  the  entire  committee  and  any 
alterations  suggested,  and  debated  till  all  were 
of  one  mind,  and  fully  agreed  as  to  both  doctrine 
and  expression.     And  when  any  title  or  chapter 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        47 

had  been  thus  thoroughly  prepared  by  the  com- 
mittee, it  was  reported  to  the  assembly,  and  again 
subjected  to  the  most  minute  and  careful  investi- 
gation, in  every  paragraph,  sentence,  and  even 
word.  All  that  learning  the  most  profound  and 
extensive,  intellect  the  most  acute  and  searching, 
and  piety  the  most  sincere  and  earnest,  could 
accomplish,  was  thus  concentrated  in  the  West- 
minster Assembly's  Confession  of  Faith,  which 
may  be  safely  termed  the  most  perfect  statement 
of  Systematic  Theology  ever  framed  by  the  Chris- 
tian Church."  ^ 

The  evident  sincerity  of  the  author  may  excuse 
but  cannot  justify  this  extravagant  laudation  of 
a  doctrinal  formulary,  which  expresses  the  hardest 
and  least  acceptable  of  theological  systems  in 
the  most  crudely  uncompromising  terms,  and 
was  indeed  the  work  of  indifferent  scholars  in  a 
bitterly  controversial  mood.  In  attempting  to 
mitigate  the  burden  of  subscription  to  the  West- 
minster Confession  the  unestablished  Scottish 
churches  have  adopted  the  expedient  of  passing 
"Declaratory  Acts,"  explaining  the  sense  in 
which  the  churches  intend  the  formula  of  sub- 
scription to  be  understood.  The  expedient  is 
more  ingenious  than  satisfying,  for  the  authorized 
sense  too  plainly  contradicts  both  the  precise 
language  and  the  known  intention  of  the  Confes- 

'  V.  History  of  the  Westminster  Assembly  of  Divines,  by 
W.  M.  Hetherington,  D.D.,  4th  Edition.     Edinburgh,  1878. 


48        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

sion  itself.  The  United  Free  Church  has  com- 
bined the  "Declaratory  Acts"  of  the  two  churches 
of  which  it  has  been  formed.  The  Established 
Church  is  still  engaged  in  the  perplexing  task  of 
drafting  a  new  formula  of  subscription. 

The  action  of  the  churches  has  a  wider  influ- 
ence on  the  legal  subscriptions  than  may  be  sup- 
posed or  intended.  It  sanctions  a  method  of 
handhng  the  doctrinal  formularies,  as  well  as 
interprets  them  in  certain  particulars.  Take  the 
case  of  a  preacher  in  the  United  Free  Church  of 
Scotland.  At  his  Ordination  or  Induction  he  is 
required  to  declare  that  he  "sincerely  owns  and 
beHeves  the  doctrine  of  this  Church,  set  forth  in 
the  Confession  of  Faith  approven  by  Acts  of 
General  Synods  and  Assemblies";  that  he  "ac- 
knowledges the  said  doctrine  as  expressing  the 
sense  in  which  he  understands  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures, and  will  constantly  maintain  and  defend 
the  same."  He  is  further  required  to  "disown 
aU  Popish,  Arian,  Socinian,  Arminian,  Erastian, 
and  other  doctrines,  tenets,  and  opinions  whatso- 
ever, contrary  to  and  inconsistent  with  the  said 
doctrine  of  this  Church."  It  is  scarcely  possible 
to  imagine  an  ampler  or  more  precise  adherence 
to  the  distinctive  doctrine  of  the  Westminster 
Confession,  for  the  pledge  is  twofold,  first,  accept- 
ance of  the  doctrine  itself,  and,  next,  to  make 
doubly  secure,  the  "disowning"  of  its  historic 
rivals.    The  modern  Church,  however,  in  authoriz- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING     49 

ing  the  preacher  to  condition  his  adherence  to  the 
Confession  by  the  glosses  of  the  "Declaratory 
Acts,"  really  evacuates  subscription  of  all  defi- 
nite or  serviceable  meaning.  For  these  glosses 
are  really  categorical  contradictions,  and  can  only 
be  fairly  appreciated  as  cancelling  the  propositions 
which  ostensibly  they  interpret.  The  point  is 
sufficiently  important  to  merit  illustration.  The 
Confession  asserts  the  characteristic  Calvinistic 
doctrine  of  the  total  depravity  of  fallen  man  in 
terms  of  crude  and  severe  decisiveness.  Men  are 
said  to  be  "wholly  defiled  in  all  the  faculties  and 
parts  of  soul  and  body,"  "  utterly  indisposed,  dis- 
abled, and  made  opposite  to  all  good,  and  wholly 
inclined  to  all  evil,"  "bound  over  to  the  wrath  of 
God,  and  curse  of  the  law,  and  so  made  subject 
to  death,  with  all  miseries  spiritual,  temporal,  and 
eternal."  The  Declaratory  Act  takes  all  sense  out 
of  these  appalling  statements  by  declaring  "  that, 
in  holding  and  teaching  acording  to  the  Confession 
of  Faith,  the  corruption  of  man's  whole  nature 
as  fallen,  this  Church  also  maintains  that  there 
remain  tokens  of  his  greatness  as  created  in  the 
image  of  God;  that  he  possesses  a  knowledge  of 
God  and  of  duty;  that  he  is  responsible  for  com- 
pHance  with  the  moral  law  and  with  the  Gospel; 
and  that,  although  unable  without  the  aid  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  to  return  to  God,  he  is  yet  capable 
of  affections  and  actions  which  in  themselves  are 
virtuous  and  praiseworthy."     Would  it  be  excess- 


50        THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

ive  to  say  that  the  Declaratory  Act  offers  as 
a  gloss  on  the  Confession  a  careful  statement 
of  the  very  teaching  which  the  Confession  was 
designed  to  prohibit?  Again,  the  Confession 
asserts  with  the  utmost  lucidity  the  characteristic 
teaching  of  Calvin  with  respect  to  the  non-elect 
members  of  the  human  race.  "  The  rest  of  man- 
kind," runs  the  terrible  formula,  "  God  was 
pleased,  according  to  the  unsearchable  counsel 
of  his  own  will,  whereby  he  extendeth  or  with- 
holdeth  mercy  as  he  pleaseth,  for  the  glory  of  his 
sovereign  power  over  his  creatures,  to  pass  by, 
and  to  ordain  them  to  dishonour  and  wrath  for 
their  sin,  to  the  praise  of  his  glorious  justice," 
The  Declaratory  Act  takes  the  whole  sense  out 
of  this  dreadful  teaching  by  declaring  "that 
while  the  Gospel  is  the  ordinary  means  of  salva- 
tion for  those  to  whom  it  is  made  known,  yet  it 
does  not  follow,  nor  is  the  Confession  to  be  held 
as  teaching,  that  any  who  die  in  infancy  are  lost, 
or  that  God  may  not  extend  His  mercy  for  Christ's 
sake,  and  by  His  Holy  Spirit,  to  those  who  are 
beyond  the  reach  of  those  means,  as  it  may  seem 
good  to  Him,  according  to  the  riches  of  His  grace." 
Can  it  be  denied  that  this  is  the  very  teaching 
which  the  Confession  was  intended  to  disallow? 
Similarly,  when  the  Declaratory  Act  asserts  that 
"this  Church  disclaims  intolerant  or  persecuting 
principles,  and  does  not  consider  her  office-bearers, 
in  subscribing  the  Confession,  committed  to  any 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING        51 

principles  inconsistent  with  liberty  of  conscience, 
and  the  right  of  private  judgment,"  it  cannot  be 
doubted  that  it  directly  traverses  the  doctrine  of 
the  twentieth  and  twenty-third  chapters  of  the 
Westminster  Confession. 

From  all  this  it  seems  fairly  to  follow  that  the 
preacher,  when  he  finds  himself  compelled  to 
place  his  own  glosses  on  other  statements  of  the 
Westminster  Confession,  which  the  Declaratory 
Acts  have  omitted  to  handle,  but  which  are  neces- 
sarily affected  by  the  anti-Calvinistic  doctrine 
admitted  in  the  glosses  they  have  authorized, 
cannot  be  equitably  refused  the  right  to  adopt  the 
same  frank  liberty  of  setting  aside  the  distinctive 
teaching  of  the  formulary  by  which  he  is  legally 
bound.  In  other  words,  the  didactic  freedom  of 
a  preacher,  bound  by  a  subscription  which  is 
patient  of  such  interpretation  as  is  officially 
recognized  in  the  United  Free  Church,  appears 
to  be  complete:  and  it  remains  a  question  for  that 
church  whether  anything  is  really  gained  by 
exacting  a  subscription,  which  manifestly  does 
not  mean  what  it  pretends  to  mean,  and  which 
may  mean  the  precise  contrary.  Such  subscrip- 
tion cannot  be  serviceable,  and  must  be  mislead- 
ing. What  conceivable  advantage  to  the  church 
can  be  set  in  the  scales  against  the  inevitable  dis- 
credit and  perplexing  confusion? 

In  illustrating  my  argument  from  the  case  of 
the  United  Free  Church  of  Scotland,  I  must  not 


52         THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

be  supposed  to  suggest  that  the  situation  in  that 
church  differs  in  any  serious  degree  from  that 
in  the  other  Protestant  churches,  save  perhaps 
for  the  special  difficulties  inherent  in  so  Calvinistic 
a  formulary  as  the  Westminster  Confession.  The 
English  clergyman's  ''assent"  to  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles  and  the  Prayer-book  is  admittedly  com- 
patible with  a  definite  repudiation  of  a  good 
many  propositions  therein  contained,  and  there 
is  sufficient  truth  in  the  old  description  of  the 
Church  of  England  as  possessing  "a  Popish 
Liturgy,  Arminian  Clergy,  and  Calvinistic  Ar- 
ticles" to  make  the  attempt  to  deduce  from  the 
Prayer-book  a  perfectly  symmetrical  and  cohe- 
rent system  of  doctrine  rather  desperate.  It  is 
a  question  for  the  authorities  of  the  Anglican 
Church,  whether  anything  is  really  gained  by 
maintaining  the  demand  for  a  subscription  which 
pretends  so  much  and  need  mean  so  little.  It 
embarrasses  the  Enghsh  preacher,  and  it  does  not 
even  provide  the  church  with  any  security  worth 
having  against  his  doctrinal  vagaries.  It  places 
a  formidable  weapon  in  the  hands  of  scorners  of 
religion  in  general  and  opponents  of  Anglicanism 
in  particular,  for  they  can  ridicule  the  incon- 
sistency and  plausibly  question  the  sincerity  of 
preachers  at  once  so  tightly  bound  and  so  clearly 
free,  but  it  paralyzes  the  hand  of  ecclesiastical 
authority  when  it  seeks  to  restrain  the  heretic 
by  compelling  it  to  employ  as  its  legal  weapon 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        53 

a  formulary  which  not  even  the  strictly  orthodox 
can  wholly  defend.  Even  those  churches,  Con- 
gregationalist,  Baptist,  and  Methodist,  which  do 
not  require  their  preachers  to  subscribe  doctrinal 
confessions,  but  have  recourse  to  carefully  drawn 
trust-deeds  in  order  to  guarantee  in  the  pulpits 
the  continuance  of  sound  teaching,  are  found  to 
be  in  no  better  case.  A  striking  example  of  the 
impotence  of  trust-deeds  as  a  barrier  against 
theological  innovation  has  recently  attracted  wide 
notice  in  England  and  America.  It  is  said  that 
the  "  City  Temple,"  which  has  become  suddenly 
notorious  as  the  centre  of  the  "New  Theology," 
put  forward  by  its  popular  and  gifted  though 
precipitate  and  eccentric  minister,  is  held  on  a 
trust-deed,  which  prescribes  the  Westminster 
Confession  as  the  standard  of  doctrine,  which  shall 
govern  the  preaching  in  that  important  pulpit. 
Everybody  feels,  however,  that  it  would  be  in- 
tolerable to  eject  Mr,  Campbell  from  his  church 
by  appealing  to  a  document  to  which  indeed 
he  must  be  supposed  to  be  legally  bound,  but 
which  not  even  his  most  severe  critic  is  prepared 
to  accept  for  himself.  On  the  evangelical  prin- 
ciple implicit  in  the  words,  "Let  him  that  is 
without  sin  among  you  first  cast  a  stone  at  her," 
it  is  perceived  that  the  enforcement  of  the  trust- 
deed  would  be  an  infringement  of  equity. 

I  shall  be  challenged  at  this  stage  to  explain 
what  right,  if  any,  I  am  prepared  to  concede  to 


54         THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

the  denomination.  Are  no  doctrinal  pledges  to 
be  required  from  preachers?  and  must  the  con- 
gregations be  left  without  protection  to  the  theo- 
logical vagaries  of  the  clergy  ?  Postponing  for  the 
present  the  most  important  part  of  the  answer 
which  these  questions  may  receive,  I  mean,  the 
manifest  right  of  every  Christian  Church  to 
satisfy  itself,  so  far  as  is  possible,  that  the  men 
whom  it  is  desired  to  accept,  and  commission 
as  preachers  of  Christ's  religion,  are  themselves 
Christ's  disciples,  it  must  suffice  to  indicate  two 
legitimate  purposes  of  denominational  subscrip- 
tion. 

First,  the  candidate  for  the  Christian  ministry 
may  fairly  be  required  to  endorse  ex  animo  the 
distinctive  attitude  of  the  church  whose  minister 
he  aspires  to  become,  with  respect  to  other 
churches  and  to  burning  questions  of  religious 
poHtics.  It  is  manifest  that  in  the  present  state 
of  Christendom  any  man  who  feels  himself  di- 
vinely called  to  the  Christian  ministry  must  decide 
to  what  section  of  the  Christian  society  he  will 
attach  himself.  Having  made  his  choice,  it 
follows  that  he  must  accept  frankly  and  loyally 
the  consequences.  Let  me  illustrate  from  the 
case  of  my  own  church.  The  Thirty-nine  Ar- 
ticles define  the  position  of  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land with  respect  both  to  the  Church  of  Rome 
and  to  certain  sectaries,  and  also  give  authorita- 
tive answer  to  some  questions  of  great  practical 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        55 

importance  at  the  time.  It  is  admitted  that  the 
Thirty-nine  Articles  are  now  very  largely  obsolete. 
The  issues  with  which  they  are  concerned  are,  to 
a  very  great  extent,  dead  issues.  Most  part  of 
the  properly  theological  Articles,  apart,  of  course, 
from  those  which  state  the  fundamental  verities 
of  Christianity,  may  come  under  this  description. 
If  anyone  will  be  at  the  pains  to  read  through  such 
Articles  as  the  ninth,  "Of  original  or  birth-sin"; 
the  tenth,  "Of  free  will";  the  eleventh,  "Of  the 
justification  of  man";  the  twelfth,  "Of  good 
works";  the  thirteenth,  "Of  works  before  justi- 
fication"; the  fourteenth,  "Of  works  of  superero- 
gation"; the  seventeenth,  "Of  predestination  and 
election,"  not  to  mention  many  others,  he  will 
feel  at  once  that  there  is  no  reality  in  exacting 
subscription  on  such  issues  from  a  modern  Chris- 
tian. There  are,  however,  other  issues  dealt 
with  in  the  Articles,  which  are  still  living.  The 
old  controversy  with  Rome  remains  an  active 
controversy  still,  and  the  Church  of  England 
would  seem  as  fully  justified  as  ever  in  requiring 
that  her  ministers  should  accept  honestly  her 
view  of  the  issues  in  debate  between  the  churches. 
That  no  branch  of  the  visible  Church  is  exempt 
from  error  (Art.  XIX) ;  that  the  doctrinal  author- 
ity of  the  Church  is  subject  to  the  written  Word 
(XX);  that  General  Councils  are  not  properly 
infallible  (XXI) ;  that  the  Sacrament  of  the  Lord's 
Supper  was  not  ordained  of  Christ  to  be  gazed 


56        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

upon,  carried  about,  reserved,  lifted  up,  or  wor- 
shipped (XXV  and  XXVIII) ;  that  the  Cup  of  the 
Lord  is  not  to  be  denied  to  the  lay  people  (XXX) ; 
that  it  is  lawful  for  the  clergy  as  for  all  other 
Christian  men  to  marry  at  their  own  discretion 
(XXXII);  that  every  particular  or  national 
Church  hath  authority  to  ordain,  change,  and 
abolish,  ceremonies  or  rites  of  the  Church  or- 
dained only  by  man's  authority,  so  that  all  things 
be  done  to  edifying  (XXXIV) ;  that  the  Bishop  of 
Rome  hath  no  jurisdiction  in  England  (XXXVII), 
are  definitions  of  denominational  attitude  with 
respect  to  practical  matters  of  great  consequence, 
and  it  cannot  be  questioned  that  the  Church  of 
England  is  entitled  and  indeed  necessitated  to 
require  from  her  official  representatives  a  formal, 
public,  and  precise  endorsement  of  that  attitude. 
Similarly,  that  the  Moral  Law  is  binding  on  Chris- 
tian men  (VII) ;  that  Infant  Baptism  is  agreeable 
to  Christ's  institution  (XXVII);  that  capital 
punishment  is  legitimate,  and  that  Christian  men 
may  at  the  commandment  of  the  Magistrate  wear 
weapons  and  serve  in  the  wars  (XXXVII);  that 
the  riches  and  goods  of  Christians  are  not  com- 
mon, as  touching  the  right,  title,  and  possession 
of  the  same  (XXXVIII) ;  and  that  judicial  oaths 
are  not  prohibited  by  Christianity,  are  definitions 
of  denominational  attitude  on  practical  matters 
of  manifest  importance,  which  are  not  less  in 
debate  in  the  twentieth  century  than  they  were 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        57 

in  the  sixteenth.  It  is  plainly  reasonable  that 
the  Church  should  require  from  its  commissioned 
representatives  an  acceptance  of  its  platform  on 
all  such  matters. 

Next,  the  candidate  for  the  Christian  ministry 
must  be  reasonably  required  to  accept  the  work- 
ing system  of  the  church  whose  commission  he 
aspires  to  receive.  This  point  has  far  more 
importance  than  perhaps  at  first  sight  may  appear. 
The  working  system  of  a  Christian  church  pro- 
vides a  continuous  check  on  official  dishonesty. 
It  is  probably  the  most  effective  protection  against 
religious  insincerity  which  the  congregation  can 
possess.  For  no  man  who  was  not  a  very  cynical 
and  callous  hypocrite  could  contemplate  a  hfe- 
time  given  up  to  the  career  of  a  Christian  minister 
implying,  therefore,  throughout  its  course  the 
conduct  of  a  pubhc  service  of  the  congregation 
which  is  everywhere  inspired  by  the  conviction 
that  Christ  is  Divine,  the  rightful  Object  of 
Christian  worship,  unless  within  his  own  personal 
life  that  conviction  were  paramount.  The  aphor- 
ism of  the  orthodox  theologians  has  its  justifica- 
tion in  conscience  and  in  reason,  —  "  lex  orandi, 
lex  credendi."  It  seems  to  me  the  most  effective 
and  the  least  oppressive  method  of  enforcing  the 
indispensable  standard  of  personal  belief  to  em- 
phasize this  aspect  of  the  preacher's  life.  He  is 
a  man  legally  required,  legally  bound,  to  conduct 
Christian    worship.     Apart    from    personal    dis- 


58       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

cipleship,  and  the  implied  conviction  that  such 
worship  is  reasonable  and  morally  obligatory, 
his  professional  activity  would  torture  him  as  a 
very  Nessus  robe.  I  may  observe,  in  passing,  that 
this  indirect  consequence  of  the  preacher's  official 
duty  is  for  manifest  reasons  best  secured  in 
churches  which  make  use  of  liturgical  forms  in 
the  conduct  of  public  worship,  and  may  perhaps 
be  offered  as  not  the  least  important  consideration 
which  recommends  the  time-honoured  liturgical 
system.  A  manifest  incongruity  between  the 
preaching  and  the  liturgical  forms  prescribed  by 
authority  could  not  fail  to  arrest  attention,  and 
would  be  universally  recognized  to  be  intol- 
erable. 

When  all  is  said,  it  surely  must  be  allowed 
that  the  claims  of  the  churches  have  been  built 
up  mainly  at  the  cost  of  the  Church:  that  in  re- 
ducing them  we  shall  restore  the  greater  and  older 
rights  of  the  Body  of  Christ  to  their  due  promi- 
nence: that  whatever  respect  we  yield  to  them 
must  be  provisional  and  contingent;  that  the  inex- 
orable condition  of  that  respect  ought  to  be  the 
sovereign  interest  of  Christianity  itself.  Distinc- 
tive doctrinal  subscriptions  are  plainly  becoming 
unreal  throughout  the  Protestant  world;  for  the 
theological  bases  of  historic  denominations  are 
vanishing  before  the  solvents  of  history  and  criti- 
cism, and  the  churches  are  becoming  conscious 
of  substantial  agreement  in  all  necessary  truth. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING         59 

The  conviction  has  formed  in  the  minds  of  sincere 
men  in  all  the  churches,  that  the  official  parade 
of  obsolete  confessions  is  indefensible,  that  it 
brings  no  strength  to  the  cause  of  truth,  and  dan- 
gerously compromises  the  sincerity  of  spiritual 
witness.  There  are  prophets  among  us  who 
proclaim  the  approach  of  a  great  reconciliation. 
We  are  becoming  suspicious  of  denominational 
zeal,  critical  of  denominational  success.  The 
categories  of  competitive  commerce  no  longer 
seem  in  our  eyes  decent  or  even  tolerable  for  the 
expression  of  the  Rehgion  of  Fraternity.  Dean 
Ramsay  relates  the  story  of  an  English  traveller 
in  Scotland  who,  as  he  passed  through  a  district 
unusually  full  of  variously  designated  churches, 
remarked  to  the  coachman  that  there  must  be  a 
great  deal  of  religious  feehng  in  a  town  which 
produced  so  many  houses  of  God.  "Na,"  said 
the  man  quietly,  "it's  no  religion,  it's  curstness" 
i.e.,  crabbedness,  insinuating  that  acerbity  of 
temper  as  well  as  zeal  was  occasionally  the  cause 
of  congregations  being  multiplied.  It  is  high 
time  that  practical  recognition  should  be  given 
to  the  religious  agreement  which  is  acknowledged 
to  exist  behind  the  spiked  ramparts  of  discor- 
dant formularies.  "I  beheve  the  doctrine  of  the 
Episcopal  and  Presbyterian  churches  to  be  prac- 
tically identical,"  said  the  present  Moderator 
of  the  Church  of  Scotland  to  the  General  As- 
sembly.    Interchange  of  pulpits  is  becoming  com- 


6o        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

mon  between  the  preachers  of  different  churches, 
and  manifestly  it  implies  a  consciousness  of  doc- 
trinal unity.  If  such  unity  really  exists  —  and 
no  man  who  has  any  competent  acquaintance 
with  the  theological  hterature  of  the  English- 
speaking  world  will  doubt  that  it  does  —  how 
superfluous  and  futile  these  denominational  dis- 
tinctions of  doctrine  must  be!  Unhappily  in 
these  matters  reason  and  charity  have  not  the 
field  to  themselves.  Every  denomination  takes 
the  character  of  a  powerful  vested  interest,  in 
which  the  personal  vanity,  social  consequence,  and 
even  financial  advantage  of  many  individuals  are 
deeply  engaged.  This  fact  adds  sinister  weight 
to  the  arguments  of  natural  conservatism,  and 
perpetuates  distinctions  which  have  long  lost 
rehgious  meaning.  How  long  will  it  be  before 
we  perceive  that  the  denominations  have  out- 
lived their  historic  justifications,  and  now  hinder 
that  supreme  interest  of  religious  sincerity 
which  once  they  served  ?  The  bustling  mundane 
zeal  of  the  "business  men  of  the  churches,"  who 
"push"  the  fortunes  of  their  sect  with  the  un- 
scrupulous ardour  of  successful,  self-advertising 
tradesmen  is  the  strength  of  the  denominations 
and  the  bane  of  the  Church.  If  only  the  lower 
and  perverted  enthusiasms  of  denominationalism 
could  be  conquered  and  exorcised  by  a  higher  and 
more  spiritual  loyalty  to  the  family  of  Christ, 
the  essential  unreality  of  distinctive  denomina- 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING         6i 

tional  subscriptions  would  be  unreservedly  ac- 
knowledged, and  the  final  enfranchisement  of 
Christian  preachers  in  all  the  churches  finally 
secured. 


Ill 


OF    THE    EVIDENCE     OF     PERSONAL    DISCIPLESHIP 
AND   THE   OBLIGATION   OF   THE   CREEDS 

The  preacher  stands  before  his  congregation 
as  the  "ambassador  on  behalf  of  Christ."  His 
words,  therefore,  must  have  behind  them  the 
motive  of  personal  conviction,  and  the  authority 
of  personal  experience.  Only  on  that  supposi- 
tion will  the  consciences  of  honest  men  tolerate 
his  claim  to  speak  with  authority  in  the  Name 
of  Christ.  The  conception  of  a  merely  forensic 
advocacy  of  the  Gospel,  such  as  the  barrister 
brings  to  the  service  of  his  cHent,  is  wholly  intol- 
erable. No  contradiction  can  be  imagined  more 
repulsive  and  degrading  than  that  which  is  pre- 
sented by  the  spectacle  of  an  unbeHeving  preacher. 
The  mere  suspicion  of  personal  insincerity  is 
enough  to  destroy  the  preacher's  influence,  and 
to  sterilize  his  ministry.  "A  traitorous  com- 
mander, that  shooteth  nothing  against  the  enemy 
but  powder,  may  cause  his  guns  to  make  as  great 
a  sound  or  report  as  some  that  are  laden  with 
bullets:  but  he  doth  no  hurt  to  the  enemy  by  it. 
So  one  of  these  men  may  speak  loud,  and  mouth 
62 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        63 

it  with  an  affected  fervency;  but  he  seldom 
doth  any  great  execution  against  sin  and 
Satan."! 

Thus  quaintly  does  Richard  Baxter  describe 
the  spiritual  futility  of  a  ministry  which  is  vitiated 
at  the  root  by  the  lack  of  conviction.  It  is  in- 
deed the  case  that  not  the  sincerest  of  preachers 
is  personally  adequate  to  the  illustration  of  the 
Divine  message  he  proclaims,  but  such  inad- 
equacy need  not  be  fatal  to  his  work.  "  We  have 
this  treasure  in  earthen  vessels,"  wrote  the  great- 
est of  all  Christian  preachers,  "that  the  exceed- 
ing greatness  of  the  power  may  be  of  God,  and 
not  from  ourselves."  No  doubt  it  is  possible 
for  the  unfaithful  preacher  to  twist  the  thought 
of  humihty  into  the  excuse  for  indolence,  like  the 
false  priest  in  Spenser's  satire: 

To  feede  men's  soules  (quoth  he)  is  not  in  man; 

For  they  must  feed  themselves,  doo  what  we  can. 

We  are  but  charg'd  to  lay  the  meate  before: 

Eate  they  that  list,  we  need  to  doo  no  more. 

But  God  it  is  that  feedes  them  with  his  grace, 

The  bread  of  life  powr'd  downe  from  heavenly  place.' 

Lack  of  personal  conviction  is  an  absolute 
disqualification  for  the  preacher's  office,  and 
involves  the  stultification  of  his  ministry.     Other 

^v.  Gildas  Salvianus,  p.  72.  Orme's  Edition  of  Baxter's 
Practical  Works,  vol.  xiv. 

2  Mother  Hubberd's  Tale,  433-438. 


64        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

factors  are  important,  this  is  essential.  Knowl- 
edge, for  instance,  would  seem  all  but  indispen- 
sable in  the  preacher,  yet  experience  has  shown 
that  even  an  extreme  ignorance,  which  yet 
coexists  with  genuine  discipleship,  need  not  be 
destructive  of  spiritual  effect;  but  no  degree  of 
knowledge  can  make  amends  for  absence  of 
faith.  Natural  abilities  and  acquired  attain- 
ments may  be  at  their  best,  but  if  the  flame  of 
personal  devotion  be  unkindled  within  the 
preacher's  spirit,  they  will  be  altogether  inade- 
quate. Even  a  high  standard  of  morality  and 
immense  exertions  in  the  performance  of  official 
duty  cannot  compensate  for  the  absence  of  that 
"one  thing  needful,"  nor  may  large  popularity 
and  aU  the  tokens  of  professional  success  out- 
weigh the  fatal  influence  of  personal  treason, 
or  obscure  forever  the  completeness  of  spiritual 
failure.  Perhaps  there  are  no  words  of  Scrip- 
ture which  the  Christian  preacher  should  more 
constantly  have  in  his  mind  than  those  in  which 
the  Lord  described  the  final  catastrophe  of 
insincere  Christian  zealots:  "Not  everyone  that 
saith  unto  me,  Lord,  Lord,  shall  enter  into  the 
kingdom  of  heaven;  but  he  that  doeth  the  will 
of  my  father  which  is  in  heaven.  Many  will  say 
to  me  in  that  day,  Lord,  Lord,  did  we  not 
prophesy  by  thy  name,  and  by  thy  name  cast 
out  devils,  and  by  thy  name  do  many  mighty 
works?     And  then  will  I  profess  unto  them,  I 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING        65 

never  knew  you:  depart  from  me,  ye  that  work 
iniquity." 

From  all  this  it  follows  that  the  Christian  Church 
is  not  so  much  entitled,  as  imperatively  required, 
to  take  every  possible  precaution  against  the 
intrusion  of  insincere  men  into  spiritual  office. 
It  follows  not  less  evidently  that  th^  discovery  of 
effectual  securities  against  religious  insincerity 
will  be  extraordinarily  difficult.  Professions  of 
orthodox  belief  are  of  course  easily  obtained, 
but  guarantees  of  personal  discipleship  stand  on 
another  platform  altogether;  yet  the  latter  is 
the  really  essential  matter.  In  the  past  the 
Church  in  all  its  branches  has  mainly  relied  on 
exacting  detailed  evidence  of  sound  belief. 
Solemn  assurances  of  doctrinal  orthodoxy  have 
been  given,  and  followed  up  by  subscription  of 
long  lists  of  theological  propositions.  Omitting 
here  any  further  reference  to  the  special  difficul- 
ties which  attach  to  these  lengthy  denominational 
formularies,  we  must  point  out  that  the  whole 
policy  of  subscription  appears  to  imply  a  twofold 
error.  On  the  one  hand,  the  essential  character 
of  the  Christian  religion  is  misconceived  when 
so  much  importance  is  attached  to  technical 
orthodoxy.  On  the  other  hand,  the  subtle  and 
complex  nature  of  man  is  dangerously  ignored. 
There  is  no  necessary  connection  between  accu- 
rate thinking  about  reHgion,  and  a  sincere  belief 
in  it:  and  no  connection  at  all  between  formal 


66        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

declarations  of  orthodox  belief  and  genuine 
orthodoxy.  Ecclesiastics  have  been  slower  than 
politicians  to  perceive  the  practical  worthless- 
ness  of  formal  professions  exacted  as  conditions 
of  office.  Insincerity  is  little  likely  to  hesitate 
before  any  demand  for  dogmatic  subscription, 
while  the  sensitive  conscience  shrinks  from  the 
pubHc  acknowledgment  of  beliefs  which  seem 
to  have  connection  with  secular  profit.  Like 
Cordelia  in  the  great  tragedy  the  scrupulously 
conscientious  man  "cannot  heave  his  heart  into 
his  mouth"  though  great  consequences  depend 
on  his  doing  so,  but  remains  silent  while  coarser 
spirits  eagerly  and  volubly  declare  all  that  is 
required.  None  the  less  the  interest  of  true 
religion  demands  the  service  of  the  former,  not 
of  the  latter;  and  the  Church  in  obstructing  for 
the  scrupulously  conscientious  an  entrance  into 
the  official  ministry  sins  against  the  very  interest 
it  exists  to  guard.  The  Christian  religion  is  one 
thing;  the  theologies  of  Christendom  are  quite 
another.  In  confusing  acceptance  of  theological 
statements  with  proof  of  discipleship  the  Church 
has  gone  far  to  defeat  the  very  purpose  of  its 
action.  Moreover,  a  grave  question  is  raised 
by  this  procedure.  What  right  has  the  visible 
Church  to  add  to  the  requirements  of  disciple- 
ship in  the  case  of  the  Christian  minister?  It  is 
universally  admitted  that  the  primary  and  con- 
stituting element  in  a  true  vocation  to  the  min- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        67 

istry  is  the  inward  call  of  the  Holy  Spirit;  and 
that  the  function  of  the  visible  Church  is  limited 
to  the  testing  of  that  vocation,  not  to  the  substi- 
tution of  a  new  kind  of  vocation  altogether.  In 
determining  the  manner  of  that  testing  it  cannot 
be  thought  that  the  Church  is  authorized  to  pro- 
pose conditions  which  are  properly  irrelevant, 
or  which  go  beyond  the  claim  of  Christ  in  the 
Gospel. 

A  distinction  must,  of  course,  be  drawn  between 
the  demand  for  personal  belief,  and  the  require- 
ment of  adequate  knowledge.  It  is  certainly 
within  the  rights  of  the  Church  to  determine  the 
conditions  of  the  exercise  of  the  ministry;  and 
of  such  conditions  none  is  more  practically  im- 
portant than  insistence  upon  a  sufficient  stand- 
ard of  knowledge.  Securities  for  sound  morals 
cannot  be  separated  from  any  attempt  to  ascer- 
tain discipleship.  It  may  go  without  saying 
that  every  precaution  against  professional  ineffi- 
ciency ought  to  be  taken.  These,  however,  are 
not  the  points  before  us.  We  postulate  the  case 
of  a  sincere  man  persuaded  that  he  is  divinely 
called  to  the  preacher's  work,  and  on  the  ground 
of  that  conviction  seeking  from  the  Church  the 
preacher's  commission.  What  evidence  of  dis- 
cipleship may  he  fairly  be  asked  to  give?  What 
limits  to  his  "Liberty  of  Prophesying"  must  be 
held  to  be  implicit  in  his  discipleship?  What, 
if  any,  are  the  fixed  points  of  Christian   faith 


68       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

which  must  be  formulated  in  advance  of  the 
preacher's  work  as  the  conditions  which  are  to 
govern  his  thought  and  colour  his  witness? 
These  are  the  questions  which  are  exercising  the 
minds  of  serious  Christians  at  the  present  time, 
and  cannot  be  left  outside  our  present  discussion. 
It  is  manifest  that  the  problem  here  stated  is 
twofold,  presented  on  the  one  hand  to  the 
preacher's  conscience,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  to 
the  Church's  discipline.  His  "  Liberty  of  Prophe- 
sying" must  necessarily  be  restrained  by  his 
loyalty  to  the  religion;  it  may  also  be  restrained, 
rightly  or  wrongly,  by  the  authority  of  the  Church. 
For  the  due  handling  of  the  whole  question  it  is 
important  to  estabHsh  in  general  acceptance  the 
principle  that  the  demand  of  Christian  disciple- 
ship  is  one  and  the  same  for  all  Christians,  as 
well  ordained  preachers  as  laymen.  This  might 
indeed  pass  for  a  self-evident  proposition,  for  no 
preacher  can  be  more,  and  no  layman  may  be 
less,  than  a  disciple.  The  "honourable  name," 
Christian,  belongs  equally  to  both,  and  must 
carry  for  both  the  same  burden  of  obligation. 
Unhappily  this  manifest  truth  has  been  gen- 
erally ignored  by  ecclesiastical  authorities  in  the 
past,  and  is  too  little  realized  by  congregations 
at  the  present  time.  It  is  not  an  unknown  or 
even  an  infrequent  occurrence,  that  a  "heresy 
hunt"  is  raised  against  a  preacher  for  teaching 
which  the  loudest  of  his  critics  know  to  be  true; 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        69 

and  too  often  the  demand  is  made  to  withdraw 
from  the  preacher  a  liberty  which  to  all  others  is 
readily  yielded.  The  folly  of  such  action  is  only 
equalled  by  its  injustice.  How  can  the  preacher 
be  supposed  to  accept  for  himself  as  necessary 
truth  doctrines  which  he  may  not  press  upon  his 
congregation  as  equally  necessary  for  them? 
If  he  be  a  sincere  man,  he  must  so  press  them: 
if  he  fail  to  press  them,  he  may  continue  to  be 
reckoned  orthodox,  but  must  forfeit  all  right  to 
be  accounted  sincere.  Different  standards  of 
religious  knowledge  of  course  there  must  be; 
for  the  preacher  is  in  some  sense  an  expert  in 
sacred  things,  and  the  appointed  teacher  of  his 
brethren.  In  exacting  effective  securities  against 
disqualifying  ignorance  the  Church  is  plainly 
within  its  rights.  As  much  may  be  said  for  the 
severe  inquisition  into  character  and  reputation, 
which  may  properly  precede  ordination;  for  the 
official  competence  of  the  preacher  is  deeply 
affected  by  his  behaviour  and  public  repute. 
When,  however,  personal  belief  is  in  question,  — 
the  quality  and  quantity  of  doctrine  involved  in 
the  sincere  profession  of  discipleship,  —  there 
can  be  no  difference  between  preacher  and  lay- 
man. Many  current  controversies  would,  per- 
haps, wear  a  different  aspect  if  this  simple,  and 
indeed  self-evident,  proposition  were  applied  to 
them. 
It  is  interesting  to  notice  that  for  the  most 


70        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

part  the  Protestant  churches,  in  taking  security 
for  the  persona]  discipleship  of  those  whom  they 
admit  to  the  preacher's  office,  are  content  with 
the  confession  of  faith  impUcit  in  church  member- 
ship, though,  as  we  have  ah-eady  shown,  they 
stni  exact  in  addition  security  for  orthodox  be- 
lief by  means  of  subscription  to  the  denomina- 
tional formularies,  if  such  exist.  As  might  be 
expected,  the  estabHshed  churches  are  most 
precise  in  their  conditions  of  sacred  office.  In 
the  Church  of  England  the  pledges  exacted  at 
ordination  are  mainly  concerned  with  the  official 
duties  of  the  ministr}-,  but  the  deacon,  besides 
being  required  to  declare  his  con\iction  that  he 
has  been  ''inwardly  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost 
to  take  upon  him  this  office  and  ministry,"  has 
to  profess  his  "  unfeigned  beUef  "  of  "  all  the  canon- 
ical Scriptures  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament"; 
and  the  priest  has  to  pledge  himself  to  "be  ready, 
with  all  faithful  diligence,  to  banish  and  drive 
away  aU  erroneous  and  strange  doctrines  con- 
trar>'  to  God's  word."  It  is  a  curiously  vague 
definition  of  rehgious  error,  and  in  the  di\ided 
state  of  Christendom  somewhat  absurd.  The 
phrase,  "contrary'  to  God's  word,"  requires 
much  elucidation  before  it  can  be  of  any  prac- 
tical use,  and  perhaps  nothing  short  of  an 
unquestioned  and  infallible  authority  wUl  really 
suffice  for  the  purpose.  In  all  these  questions, 
however,  there  is  no  expHcit  profession  of  per- 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING         71 

sonal  discipleship,  nor  is  any  needed  since  the 
ceremony  of  ordination  includes  reception  of  the 
Holy  Communion  by  the  newly  ordained  min- 
ister. It  is  then  as  a  communicant  that  the 
clergyman  makes  his  declaration  of  discipleship, 
and  owns  himself  bound  in  common  with  the 
rest  of  the  faithful  to  hold  the  faith  which  is 
formally  expressed  in  the  sacramental  Creeds. 

In  the  Church  of  Scotland  the  custom  at  ordi- 
nation is  to  question  the  minister  in  similar  terms, 
though  more  searchingly  in  respect  of  doctrine, 
but  here  also  his  personal  discipleship  is  rather 
imphed  than  formally  stated,  though  the  ques- 
tion as  to  his  motives  in  seeking  the  ministerial 
office  comes  near  to  a  formal  profession  of  per- 
sonal Christianity.  No  man  who  is  not  a  dis- 
ciple could  sincerely  plead  that  "zeal  for  the 
honour  of  God,  love  to  Jesus  Christ,  and 
desire  of  saving  souls"  were  his  ''great  motives 
and  chief  inducements  to  enter  into  the  func- 
tions of  the  holy  ministry." 

The  practice  of  the  Baptist  churches  is  thus 
described  by  an  eminent  Baptist  minister  in 
reply  to  a  private  inquiry  of  mine: 

"I  have  never  signed  a  creed.  I  made  a 
statement  of  my  belief  when  I  entered  the  theo- 
logical college;  and  another  on  the  occasion  of 
my  ordination.  And  my  experience  is  that  of 
all  Baptist  ministers.  As  you  know,  we  have 
'Confessions  of  Faith'  and  historical  documents: 


72        THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

but  there  is  no  'subscription.'  Each  church 
forms  its  own  Trust  Deed  for  the  holding  of 
property;  but  'Model'  Trust  Deeds  have  been 
formed  by  assemblies  or  associations  of  Bap- 
tists like  the  Baptist  Union  of  Great  Britain  and 
Ireland,  and  the  churches  take  them,  and  adopt 
or  adapt  them,  as  they  judge  right. 

"The  principle  of  our  union  is  a  common 
experience  described  as  'conversion,'  dedication  to 
God  in  Christ;  avowal  of  discipleship  to  Christ, 
and  the  like;  and  the  interesting  historical  fact 
is  that  the  seven  millions  of  Baptists  in  the  world 
are  characterized  by  a  singular  substantial  unity 
of  faith  and  practice, 

"Thus  there  are  two  occasions  when  the  theo- 
logical and  ecclesiastical  beliefs  of  the  ministers 
are  subjected  to  something  approaching  to  a 
test.  The  first  when  he  enters  one  of  the  col- 
leges; but  then  he  has  not  a  creed  set  before  him 
to  sign;  he  states  his  own  belief,  and  the  Council 
that  controls  the  college  determines  whether  or 
no  he  shall  be  trained  for  the  Baptist  ministry. 

"  The  second  is  when  he  is  '  ordained '  or  '  recog- 
nized.' On  that  day  he  makes  a  pubhc  avowal 
of  the  substance  of  the  teaching  he  proposes  to 
give  as  pastor  of  the  church;  but  that  statement 
is  made  after  he  is  the  accepted  pastor  of  the 
church,  and  is  made  for  the  purpose  of  his  '  recog- 
nition' by  other  churches  as  holding  that  posi- 
tion." 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING         73 

The  Congregational  churches,  as  might  be 
expected  from  their  history,  allow  the  largest 
liberty  to  the  individual  minister,  but  recent 
experience  has  raised  some  anxiety  among 
thoughtful  Congregationalists  whether  the  inter- 
est of  vital  Christian  truth  is  sufficiently  safe- 
guarded in  the  novel  and  difficult  circumstances 
of  the  time.  There  is  no  formal  profession  of 
discipleship  other  than  that  demanded  at  ad- 
mission into  the  Church.  In  the  Methodist 
churches  the  ministers  do  not  "subscribe"  any 
doctrinal  confession,  but  before  being  admitted, 
and,  formally,  every  year  afterwards,  the  ques- 
tion is  asked  with  respect  to  every  minister, 
"Does  he  believe  our  doctrines?"  "Our  doc- 
trines" are  contained  in  the  four  volumes  of 
Wesley's  Sermons,  and  in  his  "Notes  on  the  New 
Testament."  It  is  evident  that  a  doctrinal  stand- 
ard so  loosely  defined  is  little  capable  of  precise 
enforcement,  and  in  point  of  fact  heresy  cases  in 
the  Methodist  churches  are  almost  unknown. 

From  a  cursory  view  of  the  prevaihng  systems 
we  seem  to  be  brought  back  to  Jcremy  Taylor's 
conclusion  that  the  Baptismal  Confession,  that 
is,  the  Apostles'  Creed,  is  the  sufficient  statement 
of  the  doctrinal  obligation  of  discipleship.  The 
argument  merits  a  short  statement. 

Jeremy  Taylor  postulates  that  "the  act  of 
believing  propositions  is  not  for  itself,  but  in 
order  to  certain  ends,"   and   that  consequently 


74  THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

"those  are  fundamental  points,  upon  which  we 
build  our  obedience."  Taking  for  granted  the 
traditional,  and  now  discarded,  notion  that  the 
Apostles'  Creed  was  the  very  work  of  the  Apostles 
or  their  contemporaries,  composed  "to  be  a  rule 
of  faith  to  all  Christians,"  he  infers  that  it  must 
contain  all  necessary  articles  of  belief."  The 
old  creed,  take  it  in  any  of  the  old  forms,  is  but 
an  analysis  of  that  which  S.  Paul  calls  '  the  word 
of  salvation  whereby  we  shall  be  saved,'  viz., 
that  'we  confess  Jesus  to  be  Lord,  and  that 
God  raised  Him  from  the  dead.'"  Then  he 
deduces  from  the  apostohcal  origin  and  evident 
character  of  the  Creed  its  perpetual  sufficiency: 
"  But,  if  this  was  sufficient  to  bring  men  to  heaven 
then,  why  not  now?  If  the  apostles  admitted 
all  to  their  communion  that  beheved  this  creed, 
why  shall  we  exclude  any  that  preserve  the  same 
entire?  Why  is  not  our  faith  of  these  articles 
of  as  much  efficacy  for  bringing  us  to  heaven, 
as  it  was  in  the  churches  apostolical,  who  had 
guides  more  infalHble,  that  might,  without  error, 
have  taught  them  superstructures  enough,  if 
they  had  been  necessary?"  He  will  not  allow 
the  propriety  of  making  even  the  apparently 
most  obvious  deductions  from  the  Apostles' 
Creed,  and  imposing  them  as  additional  articles 
of  faith.  "For  although  whatsoever  is  certainly 
deduced  from  any  of  these  articles,  made  already 
so  expHcit,  is  as  certainly  true,  and  as  much  to 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        75 

be  believed,  as  the  article  itself,  because  'ex  veris 
possimt  nil  nisi  vera  sequi':  yet  because  it  is  not 
certain  that  our  deductions  from  them  are  cer- 
tain, and  what  one  calls  evident  is  so  obscure 
to  another  that  he  believes  it  is  false,  it  is  the 
best  and  only  safe  course  to  rest  in  that  explica- 
tion the  apostles  have  made."  .  .  .  "And  since 
it  is  necessary  to  rest  somewhere,  lest  we  should 
run  to  an  infinity,  it  is  best  to  rest  there,  where 
the  apostles  and  churches  apostolical  rested; 
when,  not  only  they  who  are  able  to  judge,  but 
others  who  are  not,  are  equally  ascertained  of 
the  certainty  and  of  the  sufficiency  of  that  exph- 
cation."  "The  Church,"  he  says,  "hath  power 
to  intend  our  faith,  but  not  to  extend  it;  to  make 
our  belief  more  evident,  but  not  more  large  and 
comprehensive."  Even  if  this  were  not  the  case, 
charity  would  prohibit  the  Church  from  taking 
any  such  course,  "for,  by  doing  so,  she  makes 
the  narrow  way  to  heaven  narrower,  and  chalks 
out  one  path  more  to  the  devil  than  he  had 
before,  and  yet  the  way  was  broad  enough,  when 
it  was  at  the  narrowest."  Accordingly  he  refuses 
to  place  the  other  and  more  metaphysical  creeds 
of  antiquity  on  the  same  plane  of  authority. 
They  might  be  true,  probably  were  true,  but 
certainly  were  not  necessarily  so.  "Therefore, 
they  could  not  be  in  the  same  order  of  faith,  nor 
in  the  same  degrees  of  necessity  to  be  believed 
with  the  articles  apostohcal." 


76        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

Interesting  and  effective  as  this  argument 
certainly  is,  we  must  admit  that  it  has  an  archaic 
aspect,  and  cannot  as  it  stands  serve  our  turn. 
Jeremy  Taylor's  reiterated  insistence  on  the 
apostolical  origin  and  authority  of  the  Creed  is 
rather  disconcerting  to  all  who  must  perforce 
reject  the  theory  of  its  history  imphed  in  such 
insistence.  The  excellent  bishop's  conception 
of  Divine  Revelation  was  of  course  necessarily 
conditioned  by  the  circumstances  of  his  age,  and 
the  seventeenth  century  was  in  many  important 
particulars  different  from  the  twentieth.  The 
very  notion  of  a  body  of  doctrine,  more  or  less 
extensive,  committed  by  Christ  to  His  Apostles, 
to  be  by  them  in  turn  handed  on  to  the  Church 
for  jealous  guardianship  and  faithful  transmis- 
sion, requires  much  explanation  before  it  can  be 
admitted  by  the  thoughtful  and  instructed  Chris- 
tian of  the  present  time.  S.  Jude's  famous 
phrase,  "The  Faith  which  was  once  for  all 
delivered  to  the  Saints,"  has  often  passed  on 
orthodox  lips  as,  for  all  practical  purposes,  a 
synonym  for  the  developed  Creed  of  the  Catholic 
Church,  itself  the  authoritative  formulation  of 
the  primitive  deposit  of  unalterable  and  vital 
truth;  yet  we  can  now  perceive  that  so  under- 
stood the  phrase  is  dangerously  misleading. 
That  original  faith  of  discipleship  was  certainly 
not  formal  adhesion  to  any  creed,  but  rather  the 
acknowledgment  of  a  saving  knowledge  of  God 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        77 

in  Christ  gained  by  personal  experience.  Let 
me  illustrate  this  point  by  quoting  some  words 
from  a  sound  and  luminous  work  by  Dr.  Forrest 
of  Edinburgh: 

"The  fundamental  fact  in  Christianity  is  not 
the  truths  taught  by  Christ  about  God  and  man, 
but  the  embodiment  which  they  found  in  Him, 
the  supreme  and  solitary  character  of  His  per- 
sonal hfe.  Without  the  acknowledgment  of 
this  as  a  reahty  in  history  the  Gospel  records 
are  inexphcable:  and  the  belief  of  it  lies  at 
the  basis  of  all  that  Christianity  has  been  to 
men."  ^ 

In  these  words  we  are,  so  to  say,  placed  on 
the  right  track.  In  another  passage  the  writer 
expresses  himself  thus: 

"The  teaching  was  not  the  ultimate  thing  in 
Christ.  It  formed  but  one  part  of  His  three- 
fold self-revelation.  Even  the  disciples  during 
His  ministry  felt  that  behind  His  words  lay  a 
personal  life  of  which  these  were  no  full  expres- 
sion, and  which  revealed  itself  in  act  as  well  as 
speech.  And  it  was  from  the  increasing  per- 
ception of  what  this  life  was  that  they  gradually 
reconstrued  His  sayings.  The  resurrection  was 
the  final  demonstration  to  them  that  His  person- 
ality constituted  the  center  and  secret  of  His 
message.  And  it  had  this  power  for  them,  just 
because  it  gathered  up  into  a  unity  their  varied 

1 V.  "The  Christ  of  History  and  of  Experience,"  p.  466. 


78        THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

experiences  of  Him,  and  completed  and  con- 
firmed the  dim  convictions  of  their  hearts."* 

We  are  reminded  that  behind  the  behef  of 
the  Apostles  lay  their  spiritual  experience,  and 
that  this  experience  was  both  a  selecting  and  an 
interpreting  power. 

Apphed  to  their  reminiscences  of  the  Master's 
earthly  Ufe,  it  sifted  out  from  the  mingled  mass 
such  elements  as  explained  or  illustrated  the 
convictions  about  Him  to  which  they  had  been 
led.  The  process  of  sifting  imphed  also  an  inter- 
pretation of  the  facts  themselves,  so  that  the  his- 
tory became  the  vehicle  of  spiritual  truth.  What 
the  author  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  says  of  his  own 
method  might  with  equal  truth  have  been  said 
by  the  other  evangehsts:  "IMany  other  signs  did 
Jesus  in  the  presence  of  His  disciples,  which  are 
not  written  in  this  book:  but  these  are  written, 
that  ye  may  beheve  that  Jesus  is  the  Christ, 
the  Son  of  God:  and  that  believing  ye  may  have 
Hfe  in  His  name." 

Apart  from  the  spiritual  experiences  which 
determined  apostolic  convictions,  the  evangel- 
ical history  might  have  had  another  aspect,  but 
in  face  of  those  experiences  none  other  was  pos- 
sible. Those  experiences,  moreover,  were  truly 
representative,  at  least  in  all  that  went  to  the 
fashioning  of  religious  conviction.  Hence  the 
apostolic  preaching  was  effectual  in  multiplying 

^v.  Ibid.,  p.  322. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        79 

disciples.  The  phenomenon  of  conversion  has 
been  renewed  from  the  first  age  until  the  present 
time,  and  has  resulted  in  the  creation  of  the 
Christian  society  to  which  we  belong.  What  is 
the  bearing  of  all  this  on  our  present  discussion? 
We  can  see  that  to  endorse  the  apostohc  ver- 
sion of  the  historical  facts  reveals  discipleship, 
because  it  imphes  the  existence  of  those  very 
convictions  which  originally  determined  that 
version.  It  follows  that  the  Creed  is  properly 
to  be  regarded  as  the  register  of  beliefs  based  on 
Christian  experience,  verifiable  afresh  to  every 
generation  because  the  experience  is  continuing, 
and  providing  thus,  in  so  far  as  those  beliefs  are 
verifiable,  a  sufficient  test  of  personal  disciple- 
ship. The  Apostles'  Creed,  then,  in  so  far  as  it 
is  verifiable  in  Christian  experience,  may  serve 
the  modem  Church  as  a  test  of  the  preacher's 
personal  discipleship,  because  the  honest  pro- 
fession of  the  Apostles'  Creed  must  imply  a 
personal  experience  which  authenticates  its  rehg- 
ous  affirmations,  so  far  of  course  as  they  are 
properly  capable  of  authentication. 

Where  the  statements  of  the  Creed  are  not 
capable  of  authentication  in  personal  experience, 
they  must  be  held  to  have  no  abiding  spiritual 
importance,  and  accordingly  their  acceptance 
ought  not  to  be  insisted  upon  as  indispensable 
in  the  Christian,  whether  preacher  or  layman. 
A  striking  passage  in  Richard  Holt  Hutton's 


8o        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

suggestive  Essay  on  "  The  Incarnation  and  Prin- 
ciples of  Evidence"  indicates  both  the  futility 
of  such  insistence,  and  the  reason  of  it: 

"Every  step  in  the  history  of  dogmatic  ortho- 
doxy has  been  an  effort  to  fortify  some  rehable 
human  base  for  a  divine  inf allibiHty  —  to  sHde 
in  a  false  bottom  into  the  abyss  of  Eternal  Truth 
—  to  justify  the  exchange  of  the  arduous  duty  of 
discriminating  what  God  has  told  us  of  Him- 
self, for  some  such  (apparently)  easier  duty  as 
discriminating  what  a  given  Church  or  a  given 
book  states  that  He  has  told  us,  which  may  be 
important  enough  on  a  secondary  point,  as  shew- 
ing the  drift  of  the  earhest  historical  traditions, 
but  can  never  be  rehed  upon  for  the  ultimate 
foundations  of  faith."  i 

It  will  be  sufficiently  manifest  that  I  dissent 
from  the  mechanical  conception  of  creeds  which 
has  recently  been  expressed  by  the  ablest  and 
most  widely  influential  of  the  EngHsh  bishops, 
and  that  I  regard  as  deplorably  mistaken  the 
practical  poHcy  which  has  been  based  on  it. 
The  attempt  which  is  being  made  in  England  to 
limit  the  "Liberty  of  Prophesying"  by  invoking 
the  authority  of  the  letter  of  the  creeds  is  of  more 
than  local  interest  and  importance,  and  I  shall 
make  no  apology  for  directing  attention  to  it  in 
these  lectures.  In  his  primary  charge,  dehvered 
in   October,    1904,   and   since  widely  circulated 

^v.  "Theological  Essays,"  p.  243. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        8i 

under  the  title  "Spiritual  Efficiency,"  Bishop 
Gore,  of  Birmingham,  has  set  forward,  with 
conspicuous  ability  and  characteristic  courage, 
the  views  which  I  desire  to  combat.  The  charge 
bears  directly  on  the  subject  of  our  present  dis- 
cussion, and  I  may  with  advantage  make  a  few 
observations  upon  it.  The  bishop  postulates 
bluntly  that  "there  must  be  no  compromise  as 
regards  the  fundamental  creeds."  More  logical 
and  less  charitable  than  Jeremy  Taylor,  he 
will  exact  adhesion  to  the  literal  sense  of  the 
three  creeds  recognized  in  the  Prayer-book,  and 
declared  by  the  Articles  to  be  "proved  by  most 
certain  warrants  of  holy  Scripture."  To  this 
large  demand,  indeed,  he  admits,  with  curious 
inconsistency,  a  single  exception.  The  "damna- 
tory clauses"  of  the  so-called  Athanasian  Creed 
are  "by  almost  all  of  us"  treated  with  laxity, 
which  is  to  be  severely  repressed  in  every  other 
application.  Apart  from  this  concession,  there 
must  be  no  relenting.  "When  the  clergy,  as 
representatives  and  mouthpieces  of  the  Church, 
stand  saying,  'I  beHeve,'  there  must  be  no  doubt 
that  they  mean  what  they  say."  Other  subscrip- 
tions implying  belief,  such,  for  instance,  as  those 
by  which  the  clergy  are  legally  bound  to  the 
Prayer-book,  the  Articles,  and  the  Scriptures, 
need  not  be  interpreted  with  precision,  but  about 
the  Creeds  no  ambiguity  is  to  be  tolerated.  A 
severe  literalism  is  to  be  insisted  upon.     He  does 


82        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

not  hesitate  to  affirm,  what  indeed  his  theory 
logically  requires,  that  the  phrases  of  the  Creeds 
do  not  fairly  admit  of  more  than  one  meaning. 
'*I  repeat,  then,  that  by  far  the  most  definite 
doctrinal  requirement  made  upon  the  clergy  is 
that  involved  in  the  continual  public  recitation 
of  the  creeds  to  which  their  office  binds  them.  '  I 
beheve  that  Jesus  Christ  is  very  God,  of  one 
substance  with  the  Father,  who  for  us  men,  and 
for  our  salvation  came  down  from  heaven,  and 
was  incarnate';  that  He  was  'born  of  the  Virgin 
Mary,'  and  that  'the  third  day  He  rose  again 
from  the  dead';  are  phrases  which  admit  of  no 
ambiguity.  The  last  clauses  are  intended,  and 
have  always  been  understood,  to  lay  all  possible 
stress  upon  the  events  recorded  having  really 
happened.  They  mean  that  the  historical  rec- 
ords which  contain  the  narratives  of  the  birth 
and  resurrection  of  Christ  are  true  in  fact. 
Now  we  are  in  our  days  challenged  by  a  not  un- 
important group  of  men  to  admit  the  legitimacy 
of  the  recitation  of  these  words  by  clergymen 
who,  at  the  least,  regard  (for  example)  our  Lord's 
birth  of  a  virgin,  or  His  bodily  resurrection,  as 
highly  doubtful.  Now  I  say,  quite  deliberately, 
let  us  be  very  gentle  with  scrupulous  and  anxious 
consciences.  Let  us  be  very  patient  with  men 
under  the  searching  and,  it  may  be,  purifying 
trial  of  doubt.  But  when  a  man  has  once  arrived 
at  the  conviction  that  he  cannot  honestly  affirm 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING     83 

a  particular  article  of  the  fundamental  creed, 
the  meaning  of  which  is  unambiguous,  to  be  true, 
let  the  public  conscience  of  the  church  tell  him 
that  he  is  not  quahfied  to  be  an  officer  of  the 
church  which  makes  the  pubHc  recitation  of  the 
clergymen's  personal  belief  in  these,  among 
other,  articles  essential  elements  in  its  great  acts 
of  worship.  What  has  been  challenged  in  this 
matter  is  the  public  conscience.  It  is  the  pubHc 
conscience  which  is  asked  to  weaken  the  obHga- 
tion  of  belief  by  consciously  allowing  an  unreal 
sense  of  explicit  words.  Let  the  public  con- 
science therefore  reply  to  the  challenge  as  ex- 
plicitly as  possible." 

It  is  apparent  that  in  all  this  the  bishop 
assumes  the  very  points  in  debate  between  him- 
self and  his  opponents.  He  draws  no  distinction 
between  those  statements  of  the  Creed  which 
certify  discipleship  because  they  are  capable  of 
verification  in  an  experience  which  creates  con- 
viction of  their  truth,  and  those  which  must  be 
accepted  solely  on  external  evidence  whether  of 
Church  or  Scripture:  he  ignores  the  fact,  which 
every  serious  student  of  the  New  Testament 
perforce  admits,  that  the  general  trustworthiness 
of  the  sacred  narratives  is  compatible  with  many 
minor  discrepancies  and  some  important  contra- 
dictions: he  assumes  that  the  modern  Church 
understands  the  phrases  of  the  Creeds  precisely 
in  the  sense  intended  by  those  who  framed  them. 


84        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

which  is  notoriously  not  the  case :  finally,  he  takes 
for  granted  that  the  judge  of  ambiguity  must  be 
other  than  the  clergyman  himself  whose  per- 
sonal rectitude  is  made  to  turn  on  the  point 
whether  or  not  he  finds  the  phrases  of  the  Creed 
ambiguous.  The  bishop  proceeds  to  deal  more 
directly  with  the  clause  which  affirms  that  our 
Lord  was  born  of  a  Virgin,  assuming  (what  none 
of  his  opponents  would  admit)  that  the  evidence 
for  the  truth  of  that  clause  is  precisely  identical 
in  nature  and  extent  with  that  on  which  the  other 
clauses  of  the  Creed  are  based.  He  states  with 
dogmatic  precision  his  personal  conviction  that 
the  evidence  is  sufficient,  and  suggests  that  only 
those  can  differ  from  this  view  who  are  disqual- 
ified by  prejudice  from  fairly  judging  the  issue. 
There  is  of  course  in  this  the  unconscious  arro- 
gance of  sacerdotal  infallibihsm,  none  the  less 
injurious  for  being  unconscious.  "It  seems  to 
me,"  wrote  Hutton  with  a  touch  of  personal 
resentment,  "  that  no  theologians  have  done  more 
to  undermine  the  power  of  Revelation  than  those 
who  have  tried  to  force  theology  on  men's  minds 
by  mere  external  authority,  which  has,  I  believe, 
no  more  capacity  to  influence  men,  without 
evoking  in  him  some  answering  response  from 
his  own  deepest  nature,  than  a  ray  of  Hght  has 
to  affect  the  ear  or  a  sound  to  impress  the  retina."  ^ 
The  main  object  is  lost  sight  of  when  another 
1 1  c.  248. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        85 

and  properly  irrelevant  object  is  admitted.  What 
is  wanted  from  the  preacher  is  a  pledge  of  per- 
sonal discipleship,  not  a  guarantee  of  accurate 
thinking.  That  indispensable  pledge  must  in- 
volve the  confession  of  such  sentiments  towards 
Christ  as  justify,  nay,  compel,  that  worship 
which  from  the  first  has  been  offered  to  Him  by 
His  disciples:  and  these  sentiments  can  only 
arise  as  they  have  ever  arisen  from  spiritual 
experiences  which  themselves  affirm  the  apos- 
tolic tradition  as  to  His  person.  This  confes- 
sion may  fitly  be  made  by  a  Christian  boy;  it 
cannot  rightly  be  exceeded  by  the  ripest  Chris- 
tian saint.  Its  character  and  range  are  not 
determined  merely  by  the  individual  for  himself; 
they  are  set  forth  in  the  apostoHc  writings,  in 
which  the  Church  has  ever  recognized,  and  must 
ever  recognize,  both  the  authoritative  rule  of 
faith,  and  the  sufficient  criterion  of  Christian 
discipleship.  The  Creeds  have  their  value  as 
summaries  of  the  apostolic  faith  about  Christ, 
Whatever  change  has  happened  in  our  estimate 
of  the  authority  of  specific  articles  in  the  Creeds 
does  but  reflect  changes  in  our  estimate  of  the 
witness  which  the  New  Testament  bears  to 
apostolic  faith.  We  know,  what  former  genera- 
tions never  suspected,  that  the  dogma  of  the 
Virgin  Birth  formed  no  part  of  the  original  preach- 
ing of  the  Apostles,  and  we  can  see  for  ourselves 
that  it  is  absent  from  their  writings.     The  vital 


86        THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

truth  of  the  Incarnation,  on  which  Christianity 
stands  or  falls,  is  set  before  us  by  the  great  theo- 
logians of  the  apostolic  age,  S.  Paul  and  the 
author  of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  differently  indeed, 
but  with  agreement  in  the  central  postulate, 
that  Jesus  is  necessarily  the  object  of  Christian 
worship;  neither  of  these  inspired  teachers  con- 
nects his  doctrine  with  the  Miraculous  Birth  of 
the  Incarnate:  both  never  refer  to  it;  both  use 
language  which  seems  difficult  to  reconcile  with 
their  knowledge  of  it.  Even  Bishop  Gore 
admits  that  "the  Virgin  Birth  was,  and  still  is, 
not  among  the  evidences  by  which  faith  is,  in  the 
first  instance,  to  be  generated."  With  the  apos- 
toUc  epistles  before  us  we  must  add  that  the  com- 
pletest  inspired  expression  of  Christian  faith 
omits  all  mention  of  it.  Those  who  now  main- 
tain the  dogma  of  the  Miraculous  Birth  do  so 
either  on  a  theory  of  Scriptural  authority  which 
no  modern  student  allows,  and  which  is  indeed 
indefensible;  or  on  purely  theological  grounds, 
identical  in  character,  though  far  superior  in 
quality,  with  those  which  in  the  Roman  Church 
have  justified  the  allied  dogmas  of  S.  Mary's 
perpetual  virginity,  and  miraculous  conception. 
Such  theological  grounds  belong  to  the  region  of 
religious  opinion,  not  to  that  of  fundamental 
truth.  Probably  most  orthodox  Christians,  if 
they  allow  themselves  to  consider  the  question 
at  all,  regard  the  Virgin  Birth  as  so  congruous 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       87 

with  a  Divine  Incarnation  as  to  be  hardly  sep- 
arable in  thought.  Justly  persuaded  that  the 
one  belief  is  essential,  they  naturally  shrink  from 
examining  the  other,  with  which  it  has  been  so 
closely  connected.  Yet  justice  demands  that 
they  should  allow  for  a  situation  which  actually 
exists.  The  difficulties  now  so  widely  felt  and 
so  frankly  confessed  by  devout  Christians  have 
their  origin  not  in  failure  of  faith  but  in  the  con- 
ditions of  modern  thought  and  study.  The 
application  to  the  sacred  writings  of  those  his- 
torical and  critical  principles  which  now  prevail 
over  the  whole  area  of  human  literature  has 
compelled  the  devoutest  believer,  who  is  also  a 
biblical  student,  to  distinguish  more  carefully 
than  his  religious  predecessors  degrees  of  cred- 
ibility in  the  primitive  tradition  enshrined  in  the 
New  Testament,  and  to  recognize  the  early 
intrusion  of  influences  unfriendly  to  historical 
truth.  The  essential  character  of  the  primitive 
tradition  has  been  unaffected,  but  the  details 
and  perspectives  of  the  Gospel  have  been  altered. 
Jeremy  Taylor's  principle,  viz.,  that  the 
apostohc  teaching  about  Christ  must  be  the 
sufficient  measure  of  necessary  truth  for  all  time, 
is  reaffirmed,  but  his  identification  of  that  teach- 
ing with  the  so-called  Apostles'  Creed  is  dis- 
allowed. S.  Paul's  summary  of  essentials  is 
perceived  to  be  more  authoritative  and  less 
ambiguous  than  any  creed:  "If  thou  shalt  con- 


88       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

fess  with  thy  mouth  Jesus  as  Lord,  and  shalt 
believe  in  thine  heart  that  God  raised  Him  from 
the  dead,  thou  shalt  be  saved."  It  is  perhaps 
worth  while  to  refer  to  the  careful  language  of 
the  bishops  assembled  last  summer  at  Lambeth. 
In  their  encycHcal  letter  there  is  this  admirable 
passage  on  "the  Faith  and  modern  Thought." 
I  quote  the  whole  passage  in  order  to  do  justice 
to  the  teaching,  and  for  its  intrinsic  merits. 

"We  turn  first  to  the  subject  of  our  faith  in 
relation  to  the  thought  of  the  present  day.  In 
humble  reverence  and  unalterable  devotion  we 
bow  before  the  mystery  of  the  Trinity  in  Unity, 
revealed  indeed  once  for  all,  but  reveahng  to  each 
generation,  and  not  least  to  our  own,  '  new  depths 
of  the  Divine.'  We  bow  before  the  mystery  of 
God  Incarnate  in  the  Person  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  this,  too,  revealed  once  for  all,  but  re- 
vealing to  our  times  with  novel  clearness  both 
God  and  man,  and  interpreting  and  confirming 
to  us  all  that  we  have  hoped  or  dreamed  concern- 
ing union  between  them.  We  reaffirm  the  essen- 
tial place  of  the  historic  facts  stated  by  the  creeds 
in  the  structure  of  our  faith.  Many  in  our  days 
have  rashly  denied  the  importance  of  these  facts, 
but  the  ideas  which  these  facts  have  in  part 
generated  and  have  always  expressed,  cannot  be 
dissociated  from  them.  Without  the  historic 
Creeds  the  ideas  would  evaporate  into  unsub- 
stantial vagueness,  and  Christianity  would  be  in 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        89 

danger  of  degenerating  into  a  nerveless  altru- 
ism." 

"Historic  facts"  are  facts  certified  by  histor- 
ical evidence,  not  alleged  facts  for  which  his- 
torical evidence  is  lacking  or  inadequate.  That 
the  Miraculous  Birth  is  not  properly  described 
as  an  "historical  fact"  is  of  course  the  conten- 
tion of  all  those  devout  Christians  who  find  them- 
selves unable  to  affirm  it:  and  that  the  phrase  in 
the  encychcal  is  designedly  used  may  be  inferred 
from  the  statement  that  "these  facts  have  always 
expressed"  the  ideas  which  they  have  in  part 
generated.  Inasmuch  as  the  vital  "ideas"  of 
Christianity  are  admittedly  expressed  in  the 
apostoHc  writings,  which  yet  contain  no  clear 
affirmation  of  the  Miraculous  Birth,  it  follows 
that  the  latter  cannot  be  regarded  as  the  true 
source  or  necessary  expression  of  any  essential 
Christian  idea.  I  am  confirmed  in  this  persua- 
sion by  the  circumstance,  of  which  I  have  per- 
sonal knowledge,  that,  at  least  in  some  dioceses 
of  the  English  Church,  men  are  ordained  whose 
conviction  of  the  Incarnation  is  confessedly  con- 
sistent with  doubt  of  the  Miraculous  Birth.  I 
have  dwelt  at  such  length  on  the  particular  case 
of  the  dogma  of  the  Virgin  Birth  because  it  is 
practically  urgent  at  the  present  time  in  all  the 
English-speaking  churches,  not  because  it  ex- 
hausts the  apphcation  to  the  Creed  of  the  prin- 
ciple I  have  formulated. 


90       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

While,  then,  the  Church  must  insist  on  taking 
from  the  preachers  whom  it  commissions  this 
pledge  of  personal  discipleship,  and  while  the 
preachers  themselves  are  solemnly  bound  to 
make  that  pledge  the  test  of  their  own  sincerity 
in  preaching,  it  cannot  be  too  much  insisted 
upon  that  guarantees  of  accurate  thinking  cannot 
rightly  or  reasonably  be  taken.  A  single  cir- 
cumstance may  suffice  to  demonstrate  the  im- 
propriety of  the  attempt,  and  its  futihty.  Most 
preachers  receive  their  commission  in  early  man- 
hood, when  their  enthusiasm  is  great,  but  their 
knowledge  is  small,  when  therefore  discipleship 
may  be  sincerely  professed,  but  Avhen  opinions 
cannot  be  safely  stereotyped.  Subsequent  read- 
ing and  thought  may  change  greatly  the  preacher's 
beliefs  without  in  the  least  diminishing  the  gen- 
uineness of  his  Christian  faith.  What  then  is 
to  be  the  position  of  a  preacher  whose  mind 
with  respect  to  the  dogma  of  the  Virgin  Birth  has 
altered,  while  his  conviction  of  the  truth  of  the 
Incarnation  of  God  in  Christ  remains  secure? 
Is  he  to  be  self-exiled  from  his  ministry,  anticipat- 
ing the  formal  verdict  of  ecclesiastical  authority 
by  his  voluntary  retirement?  I  cannot  doubt 
that  so  long  as  he  sincerely  worships  God  in 
Christ,  and  brings  to  his  ministry  a  clear  con- 
science, his  "Liberty  of  Prophesying"  ought 
not  to  be  withdrawn  on  account  of  a  perfectly 
innocent  change  of  religous  opinion. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING         91 

The  attempt  to  secure  by  preliminary  pledges 
a  guarantee  of  the  preacher's  accurate  theolog- 
ical thinking  is  irrational  because  it  presupposes 
that  there  exists  a  fixed  standard  of  theological 
accuracy.  That,  indeed,  was  the  assumption  on 
which  the  ecclesiastical  authorities  of  the  past 
have  acted,  and  which  has  transmitted  to  the 
modem  church  its  lengthy  and  embarrassing 
theological  formularies.  We  know,  however, 
that  theology  is  in  continual  flux.  The  ortho- 
doxy of  one  generation  is  the  heresy  of  another. 
Two  factors  combine  in  the  fashioning  of  Chris- 
tian theology,  and  one  of  those  factors  is  con- 
tinually changing.  A  Divine  revelation  of  truth 
made  once  for  all  in  the  Person  of  Jesus  Christ 
has  to  be  correlated  with  the  slowly  accumulat- 
ing knowledge  of  mankind.  That  knowledge 
is  never  quite  the  same  for  two  successive  genera- 
tions. Experience  always  adds  something,  and 
human  efforts  and  discoveries  add  still  more. 
A  rigid  theology  which  takes  no  count  of  the 
changing  state  of  human  knowledge  necessarily 
loses  hold  of  the  human  mind,  and  becomes 
obsolete.  Therefore,  in  any  living  church  all 
theologies  are  provisional,  and  the  attempt  to 
bind  any  theology  on  preachers  as  having  an- 
other character  is  equally  irrational  and  unjust. 


IV 


OF  THE   INTERPRETATION   OF   SCRIPTURE 
IN   SERMONS 

However  unreasonable  the  doctrinal  demands 
made  upon  the  young  preacher  at  his  ordination 
may  be,  and  however  severely  his  Church  may 
insist  on  the  letter  of  the  Creeds,  he  is  not,  in  the 
actual  circumstances  of  his  ministry,  likely  to 
find  much  practical  difficulty  from  either  unless 
he  feels  himself  compelled  to  make  it  for  himself. 
So  little  interest  is  now  felt  in  those  doctrinal 
confessions  which  enshrine  "the  stricken  theolo- 
gies of  the  Reformation"  that  he  will  not  (except 
in  jest,  which  he  may  ignore,  or  in  controversy, 
which  he  may  avoid)  be  reminded  of  his  original 
subscription.  So  vast  is  the  range  of  Christian 
truth  that,  with  a  httle  care  in  selecting  the  themes 
of  his  preaching,  he  need  not  come  into  public 
conflict  with  any  Article  of  the  Creed.  Very  dif- 
ferent, however,  is  his  case  with  respect  to  the 
Bible,  of  which  he  is  the  official  interpreter,  and 
from  which  he  must  needs  draw  the  materials  of 
his  regular  teaching.  What  "Liberty  of  Prophe- 
sying" must  the  modern  preacher  necessarily 
92 


THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING  93 

claim  and  exercise  when  he  handles  the  Bible 
in  the  pulpit? 

It  is  essential  that  in  this  discussion  we  should 
have  clearly  in  mind  the  religious  importance  of 
the  Bible  in  the  scheme  of  Christianity  as  Protes- 
tants conceive  it.  An  idea  has  gained  ground  in 
England  of  recent  years,  that  the  position  formerly 
assigned  to  the  Bible  is  excessive  and  untenable, 
implying  an  irrational  neglect  of  the  authority  of 
the  visible  Church,  and  necessitating  for  its  sup- 
port irrational  theories  of  BibHcal  inspiration.  It 
seems  to  me  that  the  older  theory,  which  was 
expressed  by  Chillingworth  in  the  memorable 
phrase,  "The  Bible  is  the  rehgion  of  Protestants," 
has  been  rather  misconceived  than  disproved; 
that,  when  rightly  understood,  it  is  true;  that  its 
practical  abandonment  by  many  modern  Protes- 
tants has  been  precipitate  and  unfortunate,  in- 
volving them  in  great  embarrassment,  and  bring- 
ing them  in  too  many  cases  to  religious  disaster. 
Chillingworth,  of  course,  lived  before  the  birth 
of  bibHcal  criticism  in  the  modern  sense  of  the 
phrase,  and,  accordingly,  his  great  book  on  the 
** Rehgion  of  Protestants"  is  compromised  in 
modern  eyes  by  the  obsolete  manner  in  which  the 
Bible  is  quoted,  but,  with  proper  allowances, 
his  argument  must  be  allowed  to  remain  valid. 
The  Bible,  which  in  this  connection  means 
the  New  Testament,  carries  to  every  honest 
student   the    knowledge   of  the  necessary  truth. 


94        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

This  is  the  grand  postulate  of  the  argument. 
Chillingworth's  language  cannot  be  improved 
upon: 

"But  speaking  truly  and  properly,  the  Scrip- 
ture is  not  a  Judge,  nor  cannot  be,  but  only  a 
sufficient  Rule,  for  those  to  judge  by,  that  believe 
it  to  be  the  Word  of  God  (as  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land and  the  Church  of  Rome  both  do) ,  what  they 
are  to  beheve,  and  what  they  are  not  to  believe. 
I  say  sufficiently  perfect,  and  sufficiently  intelHgible 
in  things  necessary,  to  all  that  have  understanding, 
whether  they  be  learned  or  unlearned.  And  my 
reason  hereof  is  convincing  and  demonstrative, 
because  nothing  is  necessary  to  be  believed  but 
what  is  plainly  revealed.  For  to  say  that  when 
a  place  of  Scripture,  by  reason  of  ambiguous 
terms,  lies  indifferent  between  divers  senses, 
whereof  one  is  true  and  the  other  is  false,  that 
God  obhges  men,  under  pain  of  damnation,  not 
to  mistake  through  error  and  human  frailty,  is  to 
make  God  a  tyrant;  and  to  say  that  He  requires 
us  certainly  to  attain  that  end,  for  the  attaining 
whereof  we  have  no  certain  means.  .  .  .  Which, 
whether  it  can  consist  with  His  Goodness,  with 
His  Wisdom,  and  with  His  Word,  I  can  leave  it 
to  honest  men  to  judge."  ^ 

Chillingworth  was  familiar  with  the  sophistry 
that  claims  to  unite  reverence  for  the  Bible  with 
the  sole  right  of  the  Church  {i.e.,  the  clergy)  to 

^v.  "  Religion  of  Protestants,"  loth  ed.,  p.  109. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        95 

interpret  it.  With  a  side-glance  at  the  legal 
tyranny  of  Charles  and  Laud  he  writes: 

"He  that  would  usurp  an  absolute  Lordship 
and  Tyranny  over  any  people,  need  not  put  him- 
self to  the  trouble  and  difhculty  of  abrogating  and 
disannulhng  the  laws  made  to  maintain  the  com- 
mon liberty,  for  he  may  frustrate  their  intent, 
and  compass  his  own  design  as  well,  if  he  can 
get  the  power  and  authority  to  interpret  them  as 
he  pleases,  and  to  have  his  interpretations  and 
additions  stand  for  laws;  if  he  can  rule  his  people 
by  his  laws,  and  his  laws  by  his  lawyers.  So 
the  Church  of  Rome,  to  estabhsh  her  tyranny 
over  men's  consciences,  needed  not  either  to 
aboHsh  or  corrupt  the  Holy  Scriptures,  the  pillars 
and  supports  of  Christian  liberty  (which  in  regard 
of  the  numerous  multitudes  of  copies  dispersed 
through  all  places,  translated  into  almost  all 
languages,  guarded  with  all  solicitous  care  and 
industry,  had  been  an  impossible  attempt);  but 
the  more  expedite  way,  and  therefore  more  likely 
to  be  successful,  was  to  gain  the  opinion  and 
esteem  of  the  pubhck  and  authorized  Interpreter 
of  them,  and  the  authority  of  adding  to  them 
what  doctrine  she  pleased  imder  the  title  of  Tra- 
ditions or  Definitions."  * 

Chillestgworth  was  absorbed,  as  were  his 
contemporaries,  with  the  controversy  with  the 
Roman  Church,  and  the  abiding  validity  of  his 

V.  Ibid.,  p.  78. 


96       THE    LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

reasoning  is  somewhat  obscured  by  the  fact  in  the 
present  day,  when  that  controversy  has  become 
tiresome.  His  general  argument,  however,  re- 
mains secure.  The  antithesis  between  Church 
and  Bible  is  really  false,  for  by  the  Bible  is  meant, 
when  the  essentials  of  the  Christian  rehgion  are 
in  debate,  the  New  Testament,  and  the  New 
Testament  has  a  twofold  character.  It  contains 
the  documentary  evidence  on  which  the  historic 
facts  are  beheved;  and  it  contains  also  the  apos- 
tohc  interpretation  of  those  facts.  In  other 
words  the  characters  both  of  Bible  and  Church 
combine  in  the  New  Testament. 

Protestantism  implies,  then,  the  supremacy  of 
the  Bible,  not  in  any  irrational  sense,  but  because 
the  Bible  contains  the  most  authoritative  version 
we  have  of  the  Revelation  of  God  in  Christ. 
Creeds  are  based  on  the  Bible,  and  stand  or  fall 
with  it.  No  tradition  of  the  Church  is  as  old 
and  trustworthy  as  that  which  is  contained  in 
the  Bible:  therefore  the  Bible  is  the  criterion  of 
tradition.  Any  change,  therefore,  in  the  estimate 
of  the  Bible,  or  in  the  method  of  its  interpreta- 
tion, must  tell  on  the  whole  system  of  Chris- 
tian belief.  That  within  the  last  half  century 
a  great  change  has  happened  in  these  resp'i^cts 
will  not.  be  disputed  by  any  well-informed 
observer  of  our  society.  This  fact  immediately 
concerns   "the   Liberty  of   Prophesying." 

An  impressive  example  of  the  older  method  of 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING        97 

handling  Scripture  is  provided  by  the  Scriptural 
references  appended  to  the  several  statements  of 
the  Westminster  Confession.  It  may  fairly  be 
presumed  that  references  offered  in  support  of 
doctrinal  conclusions,  which  were  designed  to  be 
imposed  by  authority  and  enforced  by  law,  would 
be  most  carefully  selected  as  unquestionably 
relevant  and  adequate.  Yet  these  references, 
judged  by  a  modern  standard  of  relevancy  and 
adequacy,  will  be  found  almost  grotesquely  de- 
fective. Take  the  opening  chapter  "of  the  Holy 
Scripture,"  which  really  contains  the  principle 
by  which  the  whole  dogmatic  system  set  forth  in 
the  subsequent  chapters  must  be  justified.  We 
are  told  that  "it  pleased  the  Lord,  at  sundry 
times,  and  in  divers  manners,  to  reveal  himself 
and  to  declare  his  will  unto  his  Church :  and  after- 
wards, for  the  better  preserving  and  propagating 
of  the  truth,  and  for  the  more  sure  establishment 
and  comfort  of  the  Church  against  the  corruption 
of  the  flesh,  and  the  malice  of  Satan  and  of  the 
world,  to  commit  the  sams  wholly  unto  writing.'^ 
This  statement,  of  which  the  decisive  importance 
will  be  apparent  to  everyone  who  remembers  that 
the  main  issue  of  the  Reformation  really  turned 
on  the  point  whether  or  not  the  Scriptures  did 
contain  the  whole  truth  of  Christianity,  is  sup- 
ported by  eleven  references.  The  first  three  are 
from  the  Book  of  Proverbs,  and  have  clearly  no 
bearing  on  the  subject  at  all.    The  next  two  are 


98        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

quotations  from  the  well-known  preface  to  the 
third  synoptic  Gospel,  in  which  the  evangelist 
explains  the  reason  and  method  of  his  work,  but 
says  nothing  whatever  about  either  the  purpose 
of  God,  or  the  authority  of  Scripture.  Then  we 
have  the  passage  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans 
in  which  S,  Paul  describes  the  older  Scriptures 
as  "written  for  our  learning."  It  obviously  has 
no  bearing  on  the  question  whether  or  not  the 
Scriptures  contain  the  whole  truth  of  Divine 
Revelation,  and  could  in  no  case  be  supposed  to 
apply  to  the  New  Testament,  which  at  the  time 
was  not  in  existence.  Three  references  to  the 
narrative  of  our  Lord's  Temptation  follow  next. 
These  show  that  our  Saviour  was  wont  to  use 
the  Scriptures  of  His  nation  for  the  support  of 
His  own  spirit  in  temptation,  and  that  is  assuredly 
a  fact  of  great  religious  importance,  but  it  has 
nothing  to  do  with  the  particular  point  which  it 
is  adduced  to  illustrate.  Finally  we  have  two 
verses  from  Isaiah,  which  are  not  less  irrelevant 
than  the  other  passages  referred  to,  and  cannot 
possibly  he  held  to  cover  the  case  of  writings 
produced  after  the  time  of  Isaiah.  The  modern 
Christian  would  disallow  every  one  of  the  proof- 
texts  offered  by  the  Assembly  of  Divines  for  their 
main  postulate. 

One  other  example  must  suffice.  Chapter 
XXIII,  "  Of  the  Civil  Magistrate,"  declares  that 
the  ruler  is  bound  "  to  take  order,  that  unity  and 


THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING        99 

peace  be  preserved  in  the  Church,  that  the  truth 
of  God  be  kept  pure  and  entire,  that  all  blas- 
phemies and  heresies  be  suppressed,  all  cor- 
ruptions and  abuses  in  worship  and  discipHne 
prevented  or  reformed,  and  all  the  ordinances  of 
God  duly  settled,  administered,  and  observed." 
This  teaching,  taken  in  connection  with  the  ex- 
alted theory  of  ecclesiastical  independence  which 
elsewhere  finds  expression  in  the  Confession,  may 
fairly  be  described  as  a  Protestant  ultramontan- 
ism.  It  is  supported  by  a  long  array  of  quota- 
tions from  the  Old  Testament,  all  of  which  would 
be  universally  allowed  by  modern  Christians  to 
be  wholly  irrelevant. 

In  referring  to  the  Westminster  Confession  I 
would  not  be  supposed  to  attribute  to  its  authors 
any  unusual  degree  of  unreasonableness  in  their 
treatment  of  the  Bible.  They  were  thoroughly 
representative  theologians.  The  authors  of  the 
Thirty-nine  Articles  were  indeed  too  astute  to 
give  their  reasons  for  the  doctrinal  judgments 
which  they  promulged ;  had  they  done  so,  we  can- 
not doubt  that  the  Anglican  formulary  would  have 
been  as  richly  adorned  with  misquotations  of 
Scripture  as  the  Presbyterian.  The  Prayer-book, 
however,  can  present  illustrations  enough.  The 
homily  in  the  Marriage  Service,  for  instance, 
actually  proposes  Abraham  and  Sarah  as  ideal 
exponents  of  Christian  marriage,  and  the  long 
address  in  the  Commination  Service  is,  as  a  speci- 


loo      THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

men  of  homiletic  mosaic,  a  tour  de  force,  but  the 
texts  of  Scripture  which  are  so  skilfully  dove- 
tailed into  a  sonorous  and  moving  composition 
are  torn  from  the  most  discordant  contexts  and 
made  to  carry  senses  which  nothing  short  of  the 
violence  of  devotional  exegesis  could  impose. 

It  needs  no  proving  that  the  voluminous  re- 
ligious literature  of  Christendom  exhibits  every- 
where the  same  method  of  treating  the  Bible. 
Theologians  have  built  up  their  dogmatic  systems 
on  an  exegesis  which  no  modern  student  could 
accept:  apologists  have  pressed  their  opponents 
with  "  proof -texts "  which  have  lost  relevance; 
devotional  writers  have  taken  liberties  with  the 
Scripture  which  cannot  be  justified  to  sound 
reason  or  to  sane  piety.  Even  at  the  present 
time  the  books  on  Religion,  which  have  the  widest 
popularity  in  the  churches,  are  frankly  non- 
critical;  and  at  all  times  the  steady  influence  of 
the  spiritual  classics  of  Christendom  tells  against 
change.  Public  opinion  within  the  churches  is 
fashioned  by  this  popular  literature,  and  in  turn 
fashions  the  popular  pulpit.  It  certainly  is  the 
case  that  the  modern  preacher  will  ordinarily 
receive  from  his  congregation  little  encourage- 
ment in  whatsoever  efforts  he  may  make  to 
bring  into  harmony  his  critical  conclusions  and 
his  Scriptural  interpretations.  His  professional 
interest  will  often  be  at  cross  purposes  with  his 
personal  rectitude,  and  he  will  be  tempted  to 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       loi 

conceal  his  convictions,  when  concealment  in- 
flicts a  wound  on  his  self-respect.  The  pulpit 
is  morally  a  dangerous  place  for  the  man  who  must 
enter  it,  for  (especially  if  he  possesses  what  is 
called  "the  preacher's  temperament")  he  will 
pass  under  influences,  subtle,  potent,  and  de- 
luding, which,  almost  without  his  knowledge,  will 
make  him  speak  otherwise  than  his  calm  and 
deliberate  judgment  requires.  The  congregation 
acts  on  the  preacher  almost  as  powerfully .  as  the 
preacher  on  the  congregation.  Perhaps  the  most 
weighty  consideration  in  favour  of  preaching 
written  sermons  is  that  which  arises  from  the 
relative  independence  of  congregational  influence 
which  the  manuscript  ensures  to  the  preacher. 
Rhetoric  and  sentiment,  the  facile  response  of  the 
orator  to  the  expectation  of  his  audience,  may 
conceal  the  moral  aspect  of  the  language  they 
dictate,  but  they  cannot  exorcize  from  insincerity 
its  degrading  influence  on  the  preacher's  char- 
acter. 

Ten  years  ago  the  subject  of  "Modern  Criti- 
cism and  the  Preaching  of  the  Old  Testament" 
was  treated  in  this  place  by  one  who  combines 
the  authority  of  an  eminent  critical  scholar  with 
that  of  a  powerful  and  eloquent  preacher.  Pro- 
fessor George  Adam  Smith  approached,  but 
hardly  crossed,  the  frontier  of  our  present  discus- 
sion, and  in  limiting  himself  to  the  case  of  the 
Old  Testament  he  avoided  the  preacher's  most 


I02        THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

formidable  difficulties.  Yet  none  could  have 
listened  to  those  admirable  lectures  without  feel- 
ing that  the  problem  which  they  proposed  is  a 
very  grave  one.  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  we 
have  as  yet  hardly  reaHzed  the  practical  conse- 
quences of  the  new  knowledge  we  perforce 
receive.  At  present  the  congregations,  and  in  a 
less  degree  the  preachers,  are  living  on  their 
capital  of  spiritual  associations  to  a  degree  which 
they  are  far  from  suspecting.  When  those  asso- 
ciations have  lost  their  strength,  as  surely  must 
be  the  fortune  of  all  associations  which  are  not 
continually  renewed,  still  more  when  men  have 
to  read  their  Bibles  without  their  aid,  as  must 
be  the  case  of  the  future  generations  of  Chris- 
tians, can  we  reasonably  suppose  that  the  Bible 
will  remain  the  spiritual  weapon  which  we  have 
known  it  to  be?  May  we  hope  that  though  the 
old  associations  must  perish  with  the  theories 
which  created  them,  new  and  not  less  spiritually 
helpful  associations  will  gather  about  the  Scrip- 
tures as  presented  to  believers  by  modern  scholars, 
so  that  in  the  sequel  there  shall  be  no  abiding 
impoverishment  of  the  Christian  Church? 

I  am  inclined  to  think  that  eminent  critical 
scholars  are  in  some  danger  of  mistaking  the 
practical  problem  which  they  are  in  spite  of  them- 
selves raising  for  preachers.  It  is  a  comparatively 
easy  task  to  show  that  the  Bible  as  treated  by  the 
critics  is  more  intelligible  and  not  less  interesting 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       103 

than  before ;  that  a  rational  apology  for  the  Chris- 
tian religion  is  facilitated  rather  than  embar- 
rassed by  the  change:  that  many  old  difficulties 
are  removed  by  historical  criticism.  These  facts 
may  be  admitted,  and  yet  the  preacher's  problem 
remain  unsolved.  How  is  he  to  make  the  sacred 
narrative  the  vehicle  of  spiritual  teaching,  and  to 
find  in  it  the  storehouse  of  moral  illustration? 
When  we  are  assured  that  the  absence  of  history 
from  narratives  which  have  hitherto  been  re- 
garded as  historical,  and  which  it  is  extraordi- 
narily difficult  to  understand  otherwise,  "cannot 
discredit  the  profound  moral  and  rehgious 
truths  with  which  they  are  charged,"  we  accept 
the  proposition  with  a  certain  reservation.  On 
the  one  hand,  truth  is  truth,  whether  specific 
historical  illustrations  of  it  can  or  cannot  be  pro- 
duced from  the  pages  of  the  Bible,  but,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  is  hard  to  see  how  personifications 
can  serve  the  purpose  of  examples  for  the  guidance 
of  individuals,  and  it  is  impossible  to  demon- 
strate truth  from  fictions,  or  commend  it  by 
"the  raw  material  of  myth  and  legend."  Nor 
can  I  perceive  the  relevancy  of  the  suggested 
analogy  between  the  Scriptural  narratives  and 
modern  poetry.  How  far  has  the  "spiritual  in- 
debtedness," which  Englishmen  have  acknowl- 
edged to  Milton's  "Paradise  Lost,"  really 
depended  on  their  acceptance  of  Milton's  belief 
in  the  cosmogony  which  he  borrowed  from  the 


I04       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

Bible?  If  the  Patriarchs  be  mythical  creations, 
and  not  historical  persons,  is  it  really  possible 
for  the  preacher  to  offer  them  as  examples,  or  to 
build  any  moral  teaching  on  the  narratives  which 
seem  to  tell  the  story  of  their  lives  ?  It  is  suggested 
that  there  is  an  analogy  between  the  parables 
of  Jesus  and  the  narratives  of  Genesis. 

"As  preachers,"  says  the  professor,  "we  can- 
not refuse  to  follow  the  narratives  of  Genesis 
till  we  refuse  to  follow  the  parables  of  Jesus." 
The  phrase  is  ambiguous,  and  indeed  I  cannot 
pretend  to  be  sure  that  I  know  what  is  meant 
by  "following"  the  narratives  and  parables. 
Manifestly  there  is  an  important  difference  be- 
tween the  cases.  The  parables  do  not  pretend 
to  be  anything  else;  their  sole  function  is  that  of 
didactic  instruments;  and  the  sufficient  voucher 
for  their  value  as  such  is  the  character  of  their 
Author.  The  narratives  of  Genesis  have  hitherto 
owed  their  didactic  value  solely  to  their  his- 
toricity: if  the  latter  be  destroyed,  will  the  former 
survive?  I  cannot  feel  that  this  question  is 
finally  set  at  rest  by  the  assurance  that  "if  criti- 
cism, with  the  help  of  archaeology,  has  failed  to 
establish  the  literal  truth  of  these  stories  as  per- 
sonal biographies,  it  has  on  the  other  hand  dis- 
played their  utter  fidelity  to  the  characters  of  the 
peoples  they  reflect,  and  to  the  facts  of  the  world 
and  the  Divine  guidance  in  which  these  peoples 
developed."     It  is  precisely  as  personal  biogra- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       105 

phies  that  these  narratives  have  assisted  Chris- 
tian men  since  the  days  when  the  Author  of  the 
eleventh  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews 
composed  his  "battle-roll  of  the  heroes  of  faith," 
until  the  present  time.  Can  they  be  as  spiritually 
relevant  in  any  other  character?  I  must  needs 
think  that  the  didactic  value  of  these  narratives 
will  not  ultimately  survive  the  behef  in  their  his- 
torical truth,  though  the  general  recognition  of 
the  fact  may  be  long  delayed  by  the  power  of 
old  associations.  Nevertheless,  in  the  long  run, 
I  beheve  the  Christian  preacher  will  be  helped, 
and  not  hindered,  by  the  change,  for  he  will  be 
released  from  a  convention  which,  however  au- 
thoritative and  incidentally  advantageous,  is  not 
really  sound  or  wholesome.  He  will  be  compelled 
to  draw  the  materials  of  moral  teaching  from  a 
wider  area,  to  recognize  the  operations  of  the 
Eternal  Spirit  elsewhere  than  in  Israel,  to  draw 
on  the  inexhaustible  treasury  of  Christian  biog- 
raphy, to  come  nearer  to  actual  life,  and  point 
his  moral  from  the  experience  of  his  own  con- 
temporaries. It  has  often  occurred  to  me  when 
reading  the  appointed  lessons  from  the  Old 
Testament  in  the  course  of  divine  service  that 
many  of  them  are  strangely  ill-suited  for  the 
edification  of  Christian  congregations  when  once 
the  glamour  of  pious  association  ceases  to  affect 
the  mind,  and  they  are  judged  calmly  on  their 
merits.     The   history   of   the    Christian   Church 


io6       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

cannot  be  less  edifying  than  that  of  the  primitive 
Israelites,  or  the  lives  of  Christian  saints  less 
instructive  than  the  legendary  stories  of  Hebrew 
patriarchs:  it  were  no  extravagant  assumption 
that  Christian  history  and  biography  would 
exhibit  a  marked  superiority.  Yet,  save  for  the 
Book  of  the  Acts,  the  latter  are  totally  ignored 
in  the  pubHc  service  of  the  Protestant  churches. 
If  the  change  of  opinion  with  respect  to  the 
Bible,  to  which  reference  has  been  made,  should 
have  the  effect  of  remedying  this  strange  omission, 
the  consequence  could  not  but  be  very  salutary. 
Perhaps  even  more  serious,  as  bearing  more 
directly  on  personal  religion,  is  the  changed  view 
of  prophecy  which  modern  criticism  compels. 
Will  it  be  possible  for  the  preacher  of  the  future 
to  use  the  sublime  and  familiar  language  of 
Isaiah  for  the  comfort  of  individual  Christians 
perplexed  by  doubt  or  crushed  by  affliction, 
when  once  those  whom  he  addresses  realize  as 
clearly  as  he  does  himself  that  that  language 
concerns  the  nation  of  Israel,  and  had  in  its 
author's  mind  no  such  personal  reference  as  he 
would  fain  persuade  them  to  read  into  it?  Will 
the  fifty-first  Psa,hn  be  quite  what  it  has  been  to 
Christian  penitents,  wdien  once  it  has  been  defi- 
nitely severed  in  Christian  minds  from  any  con- 
nection with  individual  penitence  ?  Have  not  the 
attempts  to  justify  the  use  in  Christian  worship 
of  the  "imprecatory"  psalms,  by  denying  their 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       107 

individual  reference,  only  had  the  effect  of  demon- 
strating their  irrelevance  without  removing  their 
impropriety?  I  must  needs  think  that  the  con- 
sequences of  the  critical  treatment  of  the  Old 
Testament  are  inadequately  realized  by  our 
Christian  critics  themselves;  that  they  uncon- 
sciously assume  that  the  attitude  towards  the 
Scriptures,  which  has  been  built  up  on  the  tra- 
ditional hypothesis  of  their  character  and  pur- 
pose, can  survive  when  that  attitude  has  been 
disallowed;  that  their  error  is  facihtated  and  dis- 
guised by  the  force  of  associations  which  must 
grow  less  as  time  passes,  and  finally  fade  away; 
that  both  preachers  and  congregations  are  still 
so  far  under  the  spell  of  the  ancient  convention 
that  they  miss  the  significance  of  their  own 
language,  and  are  bhnd  to  the  consequence  of 
their  own  action.  But  while  thus  I  differ  from 
the  Christian  critics  in  holding  that  their  work 
is  far  more  revolutionary  than  they  perceive,  I 
have  not  the  smallest  doubt  in  my  mind  that, 
speaking  broadly  of  the  main  current  of  sound 
criticism,  and  by  no  means  identifying  it  with 
the  provisional  theories  of  individual  scholars, 
they  are  true  teachers  of  the  Christian  Church 
in  our  time,  and  that  we  can  only  disregard  their 
teaching  at  the  cost  of  culpable  neglect  and,  so 
far  as  our  ministry  is  concerned,  of  spiritual 
weakness.  In  any  case,  the  preacher  who  is 
inwardly  convinced   of  the   truth  of  the   "new 


io8      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

learning"  must,  at  whatever  cost  of  embarrass- 
ment and  unpopularity,  bring  his  teaching  into 
harmony  with  it,  and  leave  the  consequences  in 
the  hands  of  that  God  of  Truth  who  may  never 
be  served  by  any  form  of  falsehood. 

The  case  of  the  Old  Testament,  however,  is 
comparatively  simple,  but  what  of  the  New? 
When  it  is  argued,  and,  within  limits  which  I 
shall  presently  indicate,  argued  rightly,  that  the 
principles  of  criticism  which  have  been  applied 
to  the  Old  Testament  cannot  reasonably  be 
refused  application  to  the  New,  the  difference 
between  the  two  cases  may  easily  be  forgotten, 
and,  indeed,  is  very  often  forgotten. 

In  the  first  place,  the  twofold  character  of  the 
New  Testament,  to  which  I  have  already  ad- 
verted, must  be  kept  in  mind,  and,  though  each 
character  may  be  separately  appraised,  the  com- 
bination of  the  two  must  have  an  important 
bearing  on  the  final  estimate  of  its  religious  value. 
The  Christian  Church  emerges  on  the  plane  of 
history  with  the  New  Testament  in  hand,  and 
offers  it  as  both  the  explanation  of  its  existence 
and  the  register  of  its  faith.  Historical  criti- 
cism has  primarily  to  determine  the  facts,  not 
to  judge  the  soundness  of  faith;  to  appraise  testi- 
mony, not  to  determine  its  spiritual  significance; 
but  this  primary  function  cannot  for  the  Christian 
student  be  isolated  or  unconditioned.  The  apos- 
tolic reading  of  the  evangelical  facts  has  its  hold 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       109 

on  him  by  other  titles  than  any  which  the  critical 
study  of  the  records  can  either  provide  or  in- 
validate. He  cannot  accept  any  other  reading 
of  the  vital  facts  save  at  the  cost  of  self-stultifi- 
cation. But  what,  it  must  be  asked,  if  the  vital 
facts  themselves  are  called  in  question? 

Let  it  be  frankly  admitted  that  Christianity  is 
an  historical  religion;  that  it  rests  on  a  basis  of 
fact;  that,  if  that  basis  be  destroyed,  it  may  sur- 
vive as  a  sentiment  but  cannot  retain  its  place 
as  a  living  faith.  There  is  certainly  much  need 
that  this  vital  connection  between  the  Christian 
religion  and  the  evangelical  history  should  be 
insisted  upon.  The  notion  is  widely  confessed 
and  admitted  that  the  Church,  having  gained 
possession  of  the  inspirnig  ideas  of  Christianity, 
need  not  concern  itself  with  the  fate  of  the  con- 
victions which  originally  guaranteed  them.  This 
appears  to  be  substantially  the  position  taken 
up  by  the  Abbe  Loisy,  and  that  section  of  the 
modernists  which  owns  his  leadership.  Nothing 
could  be  more  drastic  than  his  criticism  of  the 
Gospels.  His  grand  principle,  that  they  are  not 
to  be  regarded  as  works  of  history  but  as  works 
of  edification,  is  applied  to  the  sacred  text  with 
such  thoroughness  that  the  whole  tradition  of  the 
Saviour's  Life  and  Teaching  becomes  a  series 
of  pious  fictions  designed  to  express  the  convic- 
tions and  aspirations  of  the  Apostolic  or  sub- 
Apostolic  Church.     "It  seems  to  me,"  he  writes, 


no      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

"  that  the  dogma  of  the  Divinity  of  Jesus  Christ 
has  ever  been  and  is  still  only  a  symbol  more  or 
less  perfect  designed  to  signify  the  relationship 
which  unites  to  God  humanity  personified  in 
Jesus."  ^ 

In  fact  so  sharp  is  the  distinction  between 
history  and  faith  that  a  positive  contradiction  is 
contemplated  with  equanimity.  Something  must 
be  allowed  for  the  ill  effects  of  a  Roman  Catholic 
training,  and  something  for  the  remorseless  logic 
of  the  French  mind.  "The  opinions  of  the 
critics,"  he  writes  to  the  Bishop  of  Dijon,  "on 
the  authenticity  and  historicity  of  certain  Biblical 
writings,  on  the  character  of  the  narratives  con- 
cerning the  Infancy  of  Jesus,  and  of  those  which 
record  His  Resurrection,  have  no  need  to  be 
influenced  by  any  philosophy  in  order  to  be 
negative:  it  suffices  to  disengage  them  from 
traditional  orthodoxy.  If  similar  narratives  were 
put  forward  under  the  same  conditions  with  re- 
spect to  any  other  religion  founder  than  Christ, 
say  Mohammed,  Catholic  science  would  speak 
with  one  voice  in  declaring  them  to  be  myths 
or  legends,  and  you  would  ridicule  them  in 
your  pastoral  letters."  ^  In  these  words  Abbe 
LoiSY  seems  to  reveal  the  weakness  of  his  posi- 
tion. Not  only  does  he  suggest  a  thoroughly 
false   and    misleading   parallel   when   he  brings 

iv."  Quelques  Lettres,"  p.  149. 
-V.  Ibid.,  p.  200. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING    iii 

together  the  Founder  of  Christianity  and  the 
Founder  of  Mohammedanism,  —  for  while 
there  is  no  "problem  of  Mohammed,"  there 
is  by  universal  acknowledgment  a  "problem  of 
Jesus,"  — but  he  mistakes  the  nature  of  the  latter. 
It  is  precisely  the  unique  combination  of  a  belief 
about  Christ  which  transcends  the  possibiUties 
of  historic  proof,  and  a  historic  tradition  of  His 
Life  which  transcends  all  human  experience, 
which  constitutes  the  problem  which  every  stu- 
dent of  the  Gospel  must  face.  The  attempt  to 
provide  a  purely  natural  explanation  of  Christ 
fails  because  it  seems  to  necessitate  an  arbitrary 
limitation  of  the  historical  evidence.  The  apos- 
tolical inferences  from  the  evangeHcal  facts  are 
themselves  historical  evidences  of  great  importance 
when  the  character  of  those  facts  is  in  question. 
The  impression  made  by  Christ  on  His  followers 
must  be  accounted  for,  and  the  extraordinary 
persistence  of  His  personal  influence.  To  ex- 
plain away  the  facts  as  the  mere  creatures  of  the 
faith  which  ex  hypothesi  they  created,  is  a  violent 
procedure  equally  repugnant  to  piety  and  to 
good  sense.  Moreover  it  leaves  the  actual  prob- 
lem entirely  unsolved.  The  preacher's  concern 
with  the  criticism  of  the  New  Testament  is  neces- 
sarily conditioned  by  that  personal  discipleship 
which  he  professed  at  the  beginning  of  his  minis- 
try; which  he  reaffirms  solemnly  and  publicly 
every  time  that  he  exercises  his  ministry;  which 


112       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

has  been  secretly  strengthened  in  him  by  a  thou- 
sand experiences,  and  proved  in  circumstances 
of  trial  and  perplexity,  until  it  bears  for  him 
sanctions  too  sacred  for  description  and  too  power- 
ful for  doubt;  which  is  absolutely  indispensable 
if  that  ministry  is  not  to  be  stricken  with  a  fatal 
and  sterilizing  insincerity.  The  preacher,  there- 
fore, cannot  accept  critical  doctrines  which  clearly 
disallow  the  behef  about  Christ  implicit  in  his 
personal  discipleship,  for  that  were  to  prefer 
probability  to  certitude,  and  set  human  reasoning 
above  Divine  witness.  Such  acceptance  would 
cancel  the  condition  on  which  he  had  received 
the  preacher's  office,  and  would  plainly  draw 
with  it  the  obligation  of  renouncing  a  ministry 
of  which  the  postulate  had  been  destroyed. 

There  is  yet  a  further  limit  to  the  preachers 
acceptance  of  critical  theories.  He  cannot  leave 
out  of  count  considerations  of  pastoral  duty.  He 
must  keep  the  main  purpose  of  his  ministry 
steadily  in  view.  He  is  not  primarily  concerned 
with  the  critical  treatment  of  the  sacred  text,  and 
his  object  is  not  to  make  of  his  hearers  skilled 
exegetes  and  theologians.  He  is  in  the  succes- 
sion of  the  Apostles,  and  may  adopt  for  himself 
their  formula  of  duty.  S.  Paul's  words  indi- 
cate both  the  claims  of  criticism,  and  the  limits 
of  their  recognition.  "We  have  renounced  the 
hidden  things  of  shame,  not  walking  in  craftiness, 
nor  handling  the  word  of  God  deceitfully;    but 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       113 

by  the  manifestation  of  the  truth  commending 
ourselves  to  every  man's  conscience  in  the  sight 
of  God"  .  .  .  "For  we  preach  not  ourselves,  but 
Christ  Jesus  as  Lord,  and  ourselves  as  your 
servants  for  Jesus'  sake."  The  preacher  is  set 
to  "preach  Christ,"  and  his  supreme  and  domi- 
nating object  is  to  make  his  hearers,  in  the  full 
sense  of  the  "honourable  Name,"  Christians. 
Accordingly,  he  avails  himself  of  critical  theories 
in  the  pulpit  only  in  so  far  as  they  assist  his  grand 
purpose  of  edification,  enabling  him  rightly  to 
interpret  the  sacred  text,  to  clear  away  the  doubts 
which  are  born  of  ignorance  and  misconception, 
to  apply  the  Divine  Gospel  to  the  illumination 
and  government  of  human  life  in  all  its  functions 
and  activities. 

These  two  Hmitations  —  that  imposed  by  per- 
sonal discipleship,  and  that  imposed  by  pastoral 
duty  —  are  more  easily  stated  than  precisely 
defined.  It  is,  indeed,  the  difficuhy  of  determin- 
ing their  rightful  effect  that  constitutes  at  the 
present  time  the  most  perplexing  of  all  the  prac- 
tical questions  which  the  Christian  preacher  must 
answer,  when  he  determines  how  he  shall  fulfil 
his  ministry.  That  he  must  find  the  answers  for 
himself  seems  to  be  manifest.  In  former  times, 
when  truth  was  conceived  of  in  terms  of  a  cast- 
iron  orthodoxy,  it  was  easy  enough  to  stake  out 
by  authority  the  hmits  of  Christian  teaching: 
but  as  we  have  shown  sufficiently  when  discussing 


114       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

the  obligation  of  denominational  confessions, 
such  authoritative  action  is  no  longer  possible. 
The  attempt  to  control  the  pulpit  by  ecclesiastical 
authority  breaks  down  before  the  initial  diffi- 
culty of  finding  a  standard  of  orthodoxy  which 
shall  both  meet  the  practical  case,  and  command 
the  sanction  of  the  general  conscience.  How  far 
is  the  Christian  preacher  free  to  accept  for  him- 
self critical  conclusions  which  innovate  on  the 
doctrinal  tradition  of  Christendom?  How  far  is 
he  morally  bound  to  bring  these  conclusions  into 
his  public  teaching?  Where  is  the  point  of  har- 
mony between  the  claims  of  personal  sincerity 
and  those  of  pastoral  charity  to  be  fixed?  What 
"reserve"  in  teaching  is  consistent  with  self- 
respect?  What  "liberty  of  prophesying"  is  con- 
sistent with  doctrinal  soundness?  These  are  the 
questions,  almost  infinitely  difficult,  which  the 
modern  preacher  must  in  the  last  resort  answer 
for  himself. 

I  am  very  conscious  of  the  temerity  which  could 
not  fail  to  attach  to  any  attempt  on  the  part  of 
an  individual  to  indicate  the  nature  of  the  answers 
which  those  questions  ought  to  receive;  and  in 
all  that  I  am  now  saying,  I  desire  to  be  under- 
stood to  be  offering  suggestions  rather  than  lay- 
ing down  propositions.  In  view  of  the  grave 
importance  and  indeed  the  urgency  of  the  sub- 
ject, I  think  you  might  fairly  accuse  me  of  lack 
of  candour  if  I  did  not  carry  the  discussion  some- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       115 

what  nearer  the  actual  issues  in  debate  at  the 
present  time,  and,  so  far  as  Hes  in  my  power, 
indicate  what  for  myself  I  should  accept  as  the 
line  of  personal  duty. 

First,  then,  we  must  clearly  distinguish  the 
limits  within  which  historical  criticism  can  speak 
with  authority.  Hypothesis,  however  plausible 
and  attractive,  is  not  to  masquerade  as  demon- 
stration. Conclusions  plainly  connected  with  the 
critic's  parti  pris  are  so  far  to  be  discounted, 
and  only  then  admitted  when,  after  due  deduction 
has  been  made,  they  can  be  sustained.  Let  us 
take  as  an  illustration  a  question  of  the  greatest 
rehgious  importance  —  the  sinlessness  of  Christ. 
"Christ's  character,"  it  has  been  truly  said, 
"is  the  one  miracle  vitally  important  to  faith. 
Believers  could  part  with  the  physical  miracles 
of  the  Gospels  if  science  or  exegesis  demanded 
the  sacrifice;  but  if  a  sinless  Christ  were  taken 
from  us  on  the  plea  that  the  moral  order  of  the 
world  knows  only  of  imperfect  men,  all  would 
be  lost."  1 

This  language  is  not  excessive.  The  sinless- 
ness of  Christ  is  vital  to  Christianity.  How 
then  does  the  matter  stand  to-day,  when  from 
our  modern  standpoint  we  examine  the  docu- 
ments? What  bearing  has  the  criticism  of  the 
evidence  on  the  behef  of  the  Church?     We  may 

^v.  "The  Miraculous  Element  in  the  Gospels,"  p.  321,  by 
Professsor  A.  B.  Bruce. 


ii6      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

admit  at  once  that  sinlessness  is  incapable  of 
proof;  no  man  can  read  the  thoughts  of  his  fel- 
lows, nor  may  the  most  detailed  testimony  extend 
to  a  complete  revelation  of  character  and  life. 
So  far,  therefore,  we  admit  that  our  conviction 
that  Christ  was  sinless  must  have  other  basis 
than  that  of  the  documents.  These,  however, 
can  certainly  disallow  what  as  certainly  they 
cannot  demonstrate.  The  essential  point  is 
whether  there  is  anything  in  the  documents 
which  disallows  the  conviction  of  the  Church. 
On  that  point  I  apprehend  the  answer  is  equally 
clear  and  satisfactory.  The  most  exacting  criti- 
cism has  left  untouched  the  basis  of  our  faith. 
Much  change  has  been  made  in  our  estimate  of 
Christ;  we  understand  that  much  more  of  His 
teaching  was  shaped  by  the  circum.stances  of  His 
time  and  race  than  once  was  thought  to  be  the 
case;  we  accept  without  difficulty  the  assurance 
of  those  who  claim  to  know,  that  the  teaching 
of  the  Son  of  Man  included  much  that  was 
already  current;  we  are  not  concerned  to  deny 
that  with  respect  to  large  tracts  of  knowledge  our 
Saviour,  so  far  as  we  are  able  to  learn,  stood 
with  His  own  generation.  His  notions  about 
science  and  history  and  the  sacred  literature  of 
His  nation  may  have  been,  for  aught  we  know 
to  the  contrary,  as  limited  as  those  of  His  epoch. 
We  are  told  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  that 
"it  behooved  Him  in  all  things  to  be  made  Hke 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       117 

unto  His  brethren,"  and  we  have  no  other  means 
of  knowing  how  far  that  self -surrender  to  human 
hmitations  proceeded  than  the  records  of  the 
apostolic  age.  There  is  nothing  sinful  in  un- 
avoidable ignorance,  nothing  incompatible  with 
sinlessness  in  the  natural  limitations  of  humanity. 
I  have  heard  men  object  against  the  episodes  of 
the  Blasting  of  the  Barren  Fig-tree  and  of  the 
Destruction  of  the  Gadarene  Swine;  but  then, 
who  wiU  seriously  maintain  in  either  case  the 
historical  narrative  as  it  stands?  What  critical 
student  of  the  Gospel  does  not  recognize  in  those 
strange  stories,  so  sharply  distinguished  from 
the  rest  of  the  record,  precisely  the  presence  of 
legendary  elements  which,  though  comparatively 
slight  in  extent  within  the  earliest  Christian  docu- 
ments, are  unquestionably  to  some  extent  present  ? 
Historical  criticism,  at  least,  permits  us  to  relieve 
Jesus  Christ  from  the  embarrassing  miscon- 
ceptions of  His  primitive  biographers.  Besides 
those  episodes  (which  are  plainly  irrelevant)  is 
there  anything  admittedly  historic  within  the 
Gospels  which  implies  sinfulness  in  Jesus 
Christ  ?  Frankly,  I  know  of  nothing.  We  claim, 
then,  that  we  have  a  sinless  Christ;  and  an  honest 
examination  of  the  evidences  certifies  that  there 
is  nothing  there  which  contradicts  our  claim. 
From  that  source  we  seek  no  more  than  that 
negative  conclusion;  we  seek  no  more,  and  we 
require  no  more.     The  reasons  of  the  faith  by 


ii8      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

which  the  negative  conclusion  of  historical  in- 
quiry must  grow  into  the  positive  affirmation  of 
discipleship  are  of  a  higher  and  a  firmer  kind. 
The  conscience  and  the  heart  have  their  place 
here  as  well  as  the  reason;  and  it  is  the  whole 
manifold  personality  which  rushes  forth  in  the 
cry,  "  Lord,  I  believe;  help  Thou  mine  unbelief." 

Next,  I  suggest  that  where  the  apostolic  teach- 
ing admits  of  doctrinal  liberty,  the  Christian 
preacher  may  rightly  hold  that  discipleship  ad- 
mits of  similar  liberty  now,  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  since  the  apostolic  age  that  primitive  free- 
dom has  been  gravely  impinged  upon  by  dogmatic 
restrictions.  The  bearings  of  this  suggestion  on 
recent  controversies  with  respect  to  certain 
Articles  of  the  Apostles'  Creed  is  sufficiently 
obvious.  Some  of  these  have  been  well  pointed 
out  by  Professor  Denny  in  his  recent  volume 
"Jesus  and  the  Gospels.''^ 

"There  is  one  religion  exhibited  in  every  part 
of  the  New  Testament;  from  beginning  to  end, 
in  every  writer  represented  in  it,  there  is  the  same 
attitude  of  the  soul  to  Christ.  In  other  words, 
there  is  one  faith.  But  though  there  is  one  faith, 
there  is  not  one  Christology.  All  the  New 
Testament  writers,  it  may  no  doubt  be  said,  have 
a  Christology  of  some  kind.  Faith  always  acts 
as  an  intellectual  stimulus,  and  it  never  did  so 
more  irresistibly  than  in  the  first  generation. 
When  Christ  constrained  men  to  assume  what 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       119 

we  have  called  the  Christian  attitude  to  Himself, 
He  constrained  them  at  the  same  time  to  ask  who 
the  Person  was  to  whom  such  an  attitude  was 
due.  He  constrained  them  to  think  what  His 
relations  must  be  to  God  and  man,  and  even  to 
the  universe  at  large,  to  justify  the  attitude  He 
assumed  to  them.  But  though  these  questions 
stirred  more  or  less  powerfully,  as  they  must 
always  do,  the  intelligence  of  Christians,  it  is 
impossible  for  any  scientific  student  of  the  New 
Testament  to  say  that  all  the  early  behevers,  or 
even  all  who  were  regarded  in  the  Church  as 
divinely  empowered  witnesses  to  the  Gospel, 
answered  them  in  the  same  way."^ 

Professor  Denny  perceives  the  bearing  of  this 
on  the  question  whether  or  not  belief  in  the 
Virgin  birth  of  Christ  should  be  made  an  essen- 
tial of  discipleship : 

"We  cannot  be  wrong  if  we  limit  the  funda- 
mental confession  of  faith  to  the  character  in 
which  Jesus  presented  Himself  and  was  after- 
wards by  His  Apostles  presented  to  the  world, 
without  introducing  into  it,  as  essential  con- 
ditions or  presuppositions  of  faith,  matters  of 
fact  which  originally  had  no  such  significance. 
The  question  which  Jesus  asks,  and  which  is  of 
vital  importance,  is,  Who  say  ye  that  I  am  ?  not, 
How  think  ye  that  I  came  to  be?  No  doubt  the 
two   questions    must   be   related    somehow,   but 

1  Page  395. 


I20      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

happily  it  is  possible  to  answer  the  first  by  assum- 
ing the  Christian  attitude  to  Christ,  while  the  other 
remains  in  abeyance;  and  all  that  is  urged  here 
is  that  this  ought  to  be  recognized  in  the  confes- 
sion of  the  Church."^ 

It  would  seem  difficult  to  deny  that,  with  respect 
to  the  cardinal  doctrine  of  the  Resurrection,  a 
similar  distinction  between  the  truth  in  which 
the  whole  Apostolic  Church  was  at  one,  and  the 
historical  circumstances  of  the  fact  which  that 
truth  implied,  as  to  which  a  variety  of  behefs  finds 
expression  in  the  New  Testament,  ought  to  be 
recognized. 

Lastly,  I  suggest  that  whatsoever  liberty  the 
preacher  claims  for  himself  he  should,  as  a  matter 
of  conscience  and  duty,  concede  to  others.  It  is 
truly  a  melancholy  fact  that  those  who  are  making 
on  their  own  behalf  a  large  demand  on  the  toler- 
ance of  others  should  themselves  display  in  their 
advocacy  of  opinions  which  are  admittedly  novel 
and  almost  necessarily  unpalatable  the  very 
spirit  of  intolerance.  Yet  none  can  deny  that 
this  has  been  the  case  but  too  commonly,  and  that 
the  oppression  which  has  been  inflicted  on  indi- 
viduals has  not  wholly  lacked  excuse  in  their 
scornful  dogmatism.  We  should  never  forget 
that  beliefs  which  retain  their  hold  on  men  who 
are  thoughtful,  educated,  and  devout  do  so  by 
virtue  of  their  merits,  not  of  their  defects,  and, 

1  Page  405. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       121 

indeed,  need  no  better  title  to  other  men's  respect. 
There  have  been  illusions  which  have  safe- 
guarded truth  in  days  when  an  "open  vision" 
was  impossible,  and  kept  alive  the  flame  of 
Christian  hope  in  dark  times  of  trouble.  In 
the  mingled  mass  of  traditional  Christianity 
there  are  many  protective  dogmas  which  can- 
not yet  be  dispensed  with  by  multitudes  of  the 
faithful.  Every  phase  of  religious  development 
which  has  been  traversed  by  the  Christian  Church 
is  probably  represented  in  a  modern  congrega- 
tion, and  no  past  phase  of  rehgious  thought  is 
properly  obsolete.  Reason  and  charity  unite 
to  require  the  preacher  to  think  on  these  things, 
and  to  condition  the  "liberty  of  prophesying" 
which  he  must  needs  claim  and  exercise  by  a 
sympathetic  imagination  and  a  large  tolerance. 

Some  words  written  by  Bishop  Lightfoot 
with  respect  to  recent  views  of  the  inspiration  of 
Scripture  may  well  sum  up  our  present  discussion. 
They  were  addressed  to  Archbishop  Benson 
from  his  death-bed,  and  from  part  of  the  last 
letter  which  he  wrote: 

"There  is  nothing  so  dangerous  on  such  a 
topic  as  the  desire  to  make  everything  right  and 
tight.  I  do  not  know  whether  it  is  that  my 
mind  is  not  logical,  but  I  find  that  my  faith  suffers 
nothing  by  leaving  a  thousand  questions  open, 
so  long  as  I  am  convinced  on  two  or  three  main 
lines." ' 

^v.  "Benson's  Life,"  vol.  II,  p.  289. 


V 


OF  RESERVE  IN  TEACHING,  AND  THE  CASUISTIC 
PROBLEM  OF  THE  MODERN  PREACHER'S  USE 
OF    SCRIPTURE 

The  frank  recognition  of  the  claims  of  the 
preacher's  self-respect,  and  the  consequent  in- 
sistence on  the  widest  "liberty  of  prophesying" 
which  is  compatible  with  a  genuine  discipleship, 
must  not  drive  out  of  mind  other  claims,  differ- 
ent in  character  and  opposite  in  tendency,  which 
cannot  rightly  be  ignored  by  the  preacher  when 
he  fulfils  his  solemn  and  difficult  ministry. 

"All  things  are  lawful,"  wrote  the  apostle 
of  Christian  liberty,  himself  the  greatest  of  all 
Christian  preachers,  and  immediately  added, 
"but  all  things  are  not  expedient."  It  is  indeed 
by  no  means  easy  to  determine  the  extent  of 
the  limitation  of  lawful  liberty  which  considera- 
tions of  lawful  expediency  may  impose,  and 
perhaps  it  is  not  possible  to  do  more  than  indi- 
cate their  character  in  general  terms.  Never- 
theless they  are  of  the  utmost  importance  alike 
for  the  individual  preacher,  and  for  those  to 
whom  he  preaches,  and  for  the  Church  which 

132 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       123 

has  sent  him  to  preach.  This  discussion  would 
be  lamentably  defective  if  they  were  ignored. 
However  great  the  preacher's  energy  of  character, 
range  of  knowledge,  and  decisiveness  of  personal 
conviction,  he  cannot  emancipate  himself  from 
conditions  which  inhere  in  his  ministry  as  a 
teacher,  or  from  obHgations  which  are  implicit 
in  his  Christian  profession.  We  may  distinguish 
and  formulate  four  principles  of  the  preacher's 
ministry  which  will  operate  as  conditions  of  its 
rightful  exercise,  and  therein  as  restrictions  of 
his  personal  liberty. 

First,  the  raison  d'etre  of  the  preacher  is  the 
edification  of  the  Church.  Every  procedure  on 
his  part  which  would  have  the  effect  of  destroy- 
ing or  lessening  the  ser\dceableness  of  his  min- 
istry is  by  that  very  circumstance  sufficiently 
condemned.  Every  teacher  must  come  under 
this  principle,  and  only  in  so  far  as  it  is  respected 
has  the  right  point  of  view  from  which  to  esti- 
mate the  demands  of  duty  been  gained.  Some 
self-suppression  in  the  interest  of  his  work  is 
required  from  every  worker,  and  the  higher  the 
work,  the  greater  will  be  the  extent  of  the  self- 
suppression  which  wiU  be  required.  In  the 
case  of  the  Christian  preacher  the  obligation  is 
most  of  all  imperative,  and  the  sacrifice  demanded 
clearly  greatest. 

Next,  no  public  ministry  can  be  rightly  treated 
as  purely  or  even  mainly  an  individual  concern. 


124      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

The  preacher  may  never  forget  that  he  is  the 
official  exponent  of  the  Christian  religion,  and 
the  ordained  officer  of  the  Christian  society. 
To  these  characters  he  owes  much.  Large  op- 
portunities of  teaching,  a  sympathetic  audience, 
and  general  respect  are  no  mean  advantages, 
and  all  are  derived  from  them.  But  there  is  a 
price  to  be  paid  for  these  boons,  and  payment 
must  be  made.  Grant  that  they  may  be  too 
dearly  purchased,  yet  no  thoughtful  man  will 
question  that  their  actual  value  is  very  great, 
and  that  nothing  but  a  clear  requirement  of  his 
own  conscience  could  justify  the  preacher  in 
refusing  to  pay  it,  and  foregoing  their  posses- 
sion. 

Thirdly,  every  workman  is  more  or  less  under 
the  control  of  the  material  with  which  he  is 
compelled  to  work.  The  religious  teacher  is 
also  a  workman,  and  subject  to  the  common 
conditions  of  human  work.  He,  too,  must  be 
governed  by  his  materials.  It  is  equally  unrea- 
sonable and  uncharitable  to  ignore  the  limitation 
of  individual  liberty  which  arises  from  this  cir- 
cumstance. The  wonderful  self-adaptation  to 
specific  situations  which  S.  Paul  confessed  has 
here  its  moral  justification.  We  may  borrow 
the  language  in  which  the  Apostle  describes  his 
own  method  of  preaching  in  order  the  more 
effectually  to  affirm  this  aspect  of  the  preacher's 
duty:  "For  though  I  was  free  from  all  men,  I 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       125 

brought  myself  under  bondage  to  all,  that  I 
might  gain  the  more.  And  to  the  Jews  I  be- 
came as  a  Jew,  that  I  might  gain  Jews;  to  them 
that  are  under  the  law  as  under  the  law,  not 
being  myself  under  the  law,  that  I  might  gain 
them  that  are  under  the  law,  to  them  that  are 
without  law  as  without  law,  not  being  without 
law  to  God,  but  under  law  to  Christ,  that  I 
might  gain  them  that  without  law.  To  the  weak 
I  became  weak,  that  I  might  gain  the  weak:  I 
am  become  all  things  to  all  men,  that  I  may  by 
all  means  save  some.  And  I  do  all  things  for 
the  Gospel's  sake,  that  I  may  be  a  joint  par- 
taker thereof."^ 

Fourthly,  the  condition  of  moral  influence, 
itself  the  power  of  all  didactic  success,  is  con- 
fidence. No  teacher  can  afford  to  be  indiffer- 
ent to  the  impression  he  makes,  least  of  all  the 
religious  teacher.  The  preacher  must  be  the 
vigilant  critic  of  his  own  utterances,  carrying 
himself  habitually  by  the  power  of  a  sympathetic 
imagination  into  the  position  of  his  least  intelli- 
gent and  most  prejudiced  hearer,  and  realizing 
what  sense  his  words  must  needs  convey  to  such. 
Once  let  suspicion  of  the  preacher's  personal 
piety  find  entrance  into  his  hearer's  mind,  and 
the  door  is  closed  against  reason  and  persuasion. 
Loss  of  influence  from  neglect  of  this  necessary 
prudence  destroys  the  preacher's  power  of  ser- 

1 1  Corinthians  ix.  19-23. 


126       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

vice,  and  is  all  the  greater  misfortune,  since  it 
has  also  the  character  of  a  grave  fault.  "  Giv- 
ing no  occasion  of  stumbling  in  anything,  that 
our  ministration  be  not  blamed,"  is  a  remark- 
ably suggestive  phrase  of  S.  Paul,  and  as  pro- 
ceeding from  one  who  had  in  the  eyes  of  his 
coreligionists  the  aspect  of  an  arch-innovator  not 
less  remarkably  impressive.  "Take  thought  for 
things  honourable  in  the  sight  of  all  men"  is 
an  admonition  addressed  to  all  Christians,  but 
which  surely  has  a  special  relevance  to  Chris- 
tian preachers.  These  broad  conditions  of  min- 
istry cannot  rightly  be  ignored  by  the  most 
sensitively  conscientious  and  the  most  nobly 
independent  of  Christian  preachers,  but  their 
practical  recognition  is  beset  by  many  perplex- 
ities, and  must  at  all  times  be  closely  and  even 
severely  examined.  For  it  may  conceal  even 
from  the  preacher  himself  the  influence  of  mo- 
tives which  are  repugnant  to  reason,  honour, 
charity,  and  religion.  Every  one  of  those  prin- 
ciples lends  itself  with  dangerous  facility  to  the 
degradation  of  the  preacher.  That  every  teacher 
exists  not  for  himself  but  for  those  whom  he 
teaches  is  a  sound  proposition,  which  yet  may  be 
subtly  transmuted  by  the  teacher's  timidity  or 
ambition  into  justifying  a  complaisance  dis- 
graceful to  himself  and  disastrous  to  them. 
That  the  preacher  owes  a  measure  of  self-sup- 
pression to  the  Church  which  commissions,  and 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       127 

to  the  State  which  enables,  his  ministry,  is  a 
true  proposition  which  easily  passes  into  the 
apology  for  the  most  deeply  degrading  and  the 
least  rational  of  tyrannies.  The  claim  of  ex- 
ternal authority  may  be  pushed,  and  in  Chris- 
tian experience  often  has  been  pushed,  beyond 
the  limits  of  justice  and  religion,  until  the  preacher 
becomes  the  facile  tool  of  power  civil  and  eccle- 
siastical. It  is  a  matter  of  fact  that  the  pulpits 
of  Christendom  have  been  "tuned"  to  the  ser- 
vice of  every  interest,  save  that  which  alone  they 
exist  to  serve. 

It  is  not  otherwise  with  the  sound  didactic 
principle  that  the  teacher  must  suffer  himself  to 
be  governed  by  the  human  material  which  he 
has  to  handle.  What  is  the  defence  offered  by 
the  Roman  Catholic  Church  for  the  abuses  of 
its  practical  system  —  the  polytheistic  excesses 
of  Mariolatry  and  saint-worship,  the  strange 
superstitions  connected  with  purgatory,  the  arbi- 
trary discipline  of  the  confessional,  the  morbid 
devotions  fostered  by  the  crude  materiaUsm  of 
its  sacramental  doctrine  — but  the  necessity  of 
making  the  teaching  correspond  in  manner  and 
substance  to  the  mental  state  of  the  taught?  Is 
it  necessary  to  point  out  the  facility  with  which 
the  prudence,  which  reason  and  religion  combine 
to  require  from  the  preacher  who  would  pre- 
serve his  indispensable  influence  over  those 
whom  he  aspires  to  persuade,  can  become  the 


128      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

excuse  for  the  disgraceful  and  calculated  com- 
plaisance of  the  sycophant,  the  tuft-hunter,  and 
the  demagogue?  Christendom  has  known  but 
too  well  the  parasite-preacher,  whose  standard 
of  truth  fluctuates  with  current  opinion,  and 
whose  measure  of  success  is  popularity;  to  whom 
the  frown  of  society  is  as  the  curse  of  God,  and 
who  has  his  appropriate  and  sufficient  reward  in 
its  smile.  Whether  in  the  nearly  obsolete  type 
of  the  fashionable  preacher  ridiculed  by  Thack- 
eray, or  in  the  more  dangerous  variety  of  pop- 
ular divine  characteristic  of  our  own  epoch,  the 
time-server  is  always  ready  to  defend  his  cowardly 
complaisance  and  timely  silence  by  the  plea  of 
a  just  and  reasonable  prudence. 

Keeping  steadily  in  mind,  therefore,  the  risk 
of  self-delusion,  the  Christian  preacher  must 
accept  the  necessity  of  practising  "reserve"  in 
religious  teaching.  Are  there  any  tests  by  which 
he  may  discern  between  a  right  and  a  wrong 
self-suppression?  How  shall  we  formulate  a 
doctrine  of  "reserve"  which  shall  not  violate 
the  preacher's  self-respect,  while  satisfying  the 
valid  demands  of  his  hearers? 

Perhaps  four  notes  of  legitimate  "reserve"  in 
teaching  may  be  distinguished.  These  affect 
the  motive,  purpose,  method,  and  effect  of  the 
teacher's  reticence.  It  must  be  conscientious, 
didactic,  intelligent,  and  consistent  with  funda- 
mental loyalty. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       129 

I.  Conscientious.  The  preacher,  when  he 
conceals  from  his  hearers  his  own  convictions, 
and  suffers  them  to  continue  in  ignorance  of 
what  he  himself  regards  as  truth,  must  be  acting 
conscientiously  in  the  exercise  of  his  teaching 
function.  He  will  certainly  find  it  requisite  to 
criticise  his  motives  with  rigorous  severity,  for 
indolence,  or  timidity,  or  ambition  may  but  too 
easily  provide  motives  for  conduct  which  can 
only  be  legitimate  when  it  is  conscientious.  If, 
as  indeed  is  the  case,  the  very  notion  of  didactic 
reserve  is  heavily  compromised  in  religious  minds 
by  associations  of  cynical  selfishness,  the  reason 
hes  in  the  neglect  of  this  primary  condition  of 
conscientiousness.  Inevitably,  the  reticence  dic- 
tated by  the  motive  of  ambition  develops  into 
the  over-emphasis  of  hypocrisy.  The  least  con- 
vinced become  the  most  dogmatic,  and  the  world 
is  cursed  with  the  portentous  paradox  of  the 
persecuting  sceptic.  Browning  has  pointed  out 
that  consequence  when  he  makes  Bishop  Bloug- 
RAM  argue  cynically: 

If  once  we  choose  belief,  on  all  accounts 

We  can't  be  too  decisive  in  our  faith, 

Conclusive  and  exclusive  in  its  terms, 

To  suit  the  world  which  gives  us  the  good  things. 

II.  Didactic.  The  reserve  dictated  by  the 
teacher's  conscience  must  have  a  didactic  pur- 
pose.    It   will,    therefore,   be   designedly   provi- 


I30       THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

sional  and  temporary.  There  can  be  no  such 
thing  as  a  deliberate  stereotyping  of  ignorance; 
whatever  acquiescence  in  error  is  admitted  into 
the  preacher's  method  must  be  honestly  deter- 
mined in  the  interest  of  truth.  This  is  only 
another  way  of  saying  that  the  governing  interest 
in  the  process  must  be  that  of  the  learner,  not 
that  of  the  teacher.  "Reserve"  is  not  to  be 
used  as  a  means  of  perpetuating  ignorance,  but 
of  enabhng  knowledge.  It  is  not  a  politic  device 
for  riveting  the  yoke  of  authority  the  more 
securely  on  the  neck  of  the  taught,  but  a  pas- 
toral method  of  guarding  the  immature  from 
the  risks  of  excessive  strain.  Thus  the  proof 
of  legitimate  "reserve"  lies  in  the  single  point 
whether  or  not  it  tends  to  become  permanent, 
and  the  preacher  may  test  his  own  sincerity  by 
finding  out  whether  a  calculated  reticence  takes 
a  larger  or  a  smaller  place  in  the  normal  course 
of  his  teaching. 

III.  Intelligent.  The  preacher  must  seriously 
apply  his  mind  to  the  subject  as  well  as  his  con- 
science. The  "reserve"  which  he  practises 
must  not  only  be  conscientious  in  motive  and 
didactic  in  purpose,  but  also  rationally  adapted 
to  the  actual  circumstances  in  which  his  teach- 
ing ministry  must  be  carried  on.  This  tells  in 
two  directions.  On  the  one  hand,  it  compels 
the  preacher  to  distinguish  between  his  private 
opinions  and  his  clear  convictions,   and    again 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       131 

between  the  last  and  convictions  which  have 
sufficient  warrant  in  general  acceptance  to  be 
reasonably  pressed  on  others  as  having  the  august 
and  binding  character  of  truth.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  requires  the  preacher  to  correlate  his 
teaching  intelligently  with  the  mental  and  moral 
states  of  those  whom  he  aspires  to  teach.  No 
part  of  the  Christian  minister's  duty  is  more 
difficult,  and  perhaps  hardly  any  is  more  im- 
portant, than  the  due  correlation  of  pastoral 
methods  and  individual  need.  No  two  men  are 
quite  ahke  in  character,  or  have  precisely  sim- 
ilar histories.  Congregations  are  hardly  less 
distinct;  no  two  admit  of  quite  the  same  handling. 
The  root  of  most  pastoral  failures  —  apart  from 
those  which  are  plainly  caused  by  the  minister's 
wilful  fault,  or  obvious  deficiencies  —  Hes  in 
defective  acquaintance  with  the  human  material 
with  which  pastorate  is  concerned.  It  is  often 
maintained,  not  without  manifest  plausibility, 
that  Protestant  preachers  are  at  great  disadvan- 
tage when  compared  with  the  Roman  Catholic 
clergy,  since  while  the  latter  can  study  individual 
hfe  and  character  in  the  confessional,  the  former 
have  only  their  own  observation  and  experience  to 
draw  upon.  I  must  needs  think,  however,  that 
this  view  is  mistaken,  and  I  should  offer  as  suffi- 
cient proof  the  admitted  fact  —  admitted  I  mean 
by  all  disinterested  parties — that  the  Roman 
casuistry,    as    it    was    formulated    and    applied 


132       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

by  the  Jesuits,  has  been  deeply  and  subtly 
injurious  to  character.  I  attribute  this  result 
mainly  to  the  circumstance,  that  casuistic  sci- 
ence within  the  Roman  Church  has  been  devel- 
oped under  artificial  conditions,  pursued  apart 
from  contact  with  normal  human  life,  and  accord- 
ingly has  always  tended  to  a  demoralizing  un- 
reality. No  doubt  it  is  the  case  that  the  Jesuits, 
in  this  respect  unlike  the  great  mediaeval  casuists, 
were  not  monks,  but  accomplished  men  of  the 
world,  subtlest  of  politicians,  adroitest  of  cour- 
tiers. Yet  they  were  men  artificially  trained 
for  an  essentially  abnormal  manner  of  hfe,  and 
their  casuistic  laboratory  was  not  human  life  as 
seen  in  the  famihar  contacts  and  activities  of 
society,  so  much  as  the  distressed  and  diseased 
version  of  human  life  exhibited  in  the  confes- 
sional. Thus  the  presiding  assumptions  of  such 
casuistry  as  that  of  S.  Alphonsus  Ligouri  —  to 
name  the  best  known  and  perhaps  most  influ- 
ential of  the  later  casuists  —  appear  to  be  exces- 
sively unfavourable  to  human  nature.  The 
atmosphere  of  the  confessional  is  that  of  the 
sick-room,  or  even  of  the  dissecting  theatre,  never 
of  the  open  air;  we  do  not  deny  that  sick-rooms 
and  dissecting  theatres  have  their  utiHty,  if  we 
reject  both  as  models  for  ordinary  arrangements 
for  human  living.  "Casuistry"  and  the  system 
of  "direction"  by  which  it  is  applied  in  practice, 
draw  under  control  all  human  action,  carrying 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       133 

thus  the  methods  and  notions  suggested  by  dis- 
eased and  distressed  humanity  to  the  vigorous 
and  healthy  humanity  of  average  experience. 
What  is  true  of  moral  discipline  is  true  also  of 
intellectual.  The  principle  of  a  sound  pastorate 
is  fidelity  to  nature.  It  is,  I  think,  in  the  main  a 
sound  instinct  which  in  the  Protestant  churches 
has  made  preaching  a  normal  function  and 
indeed  the  principal  function  of  the  Christian 
ministry.  The  separation  of  preaching  from 
the  labours  and  distractions  of  normal  pastor- 
ate, and  its  allocation  to  specific  individuals  or 
"orders,"  who  have  no  other  official  work,  may 
be  defended  on  many  grounds.  A  higher  stand- 
ard of  formal  excellence  is  thus  secured:  the  arts 
of  rhetoric  and  the  forms  of  reasoning  are  made 
ancillary  to  preaching;  the  academic  or  cloistered 
orator  can  enrich  his  discourses  with  the  resuhs 
of  much  reading  and  reflection;  sermons  take 
rank  as  a  special  and  exalted  type  of  Hterary 
composition.  Against  these  advantages,  how- 
ever, must  be  set  grave  drawbacks,  and  among 
these,  that  loss  of  touch  with  the  realities  of  Hfe 
which  ahnost  inevitably  marks  such  preaching. 
The  preacher  who  is  also  the  pastor  labours 
under  obvious  difficulties,  but  he  has  this  supreme 
advantage,  that  his  work  is  part  of  his  very  life, 
his  knowledge  is  never  wholly  severed  from  its 
practical  connections,  his  teaching  perforce  takes 
account  of  the  bewildering  variety  of  conditions 


134      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

and  circumstances  which  his  own  experience  will 
disclose.  Perhaps  it  may  not  be  superfluous  to 
observe  that  preachers,  whether  academic  or 
pastoral,  who  are  also  students,  must  reckon 
with  the  danger  that  their  personal  interest  in 
specific  studies  shall  disturb  the  balance  of  their 
judgment,  and  give  an  unwholesome  and  lop- 
sided character  to  their  preaching.  To  this 
point  we  shall  have  to  return  presently;  here  it 
will  suffice  to  point  out  that  no  preacher  who 
seeks  to  determine  the  requirement  of  an  intelli- 
gent "reserve"  can  afford  to  leave  out  of  reckon- 
ing this  natural  and  pardonable  tendency  to 
exaggeration. 

IV.  Consistent  with  fundamental  loyalty.  No 
"reserve"  can  be  defensible  which  has  the  effect 
of  prejudicing  the  interest  which  the  preacher 
is  charged  to  serve.  That  interest  is  not  to  be 
described  solely  in  terms  of  individual  and  local 
ministry.  It  has  a  larger  range,  and  a  sublimer 
character.  Every  Christian  minister,  whatever 
may  be  his  denominational  description,  receives 
his  commission  from  no  lower  authority  than 
that  of  Christ  Himself,  exercises  the  ministry 
of  the  whole  Catholic  Church,  and  is  charged  with 
the  exposition  of  the  Christian  rehgion.  In  his 
devotion  to  the  individual  and  local  demands  of 
his  work,  the  preacher  must  not  forget  the  larger 
and  more  fundamental  aspects  of  his  ministry. 
"Nil   Christianum    a    Christiano    alienum  est." 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       135 

He  must  calculate  the  probable  effect  of  his  reti- 
cence on  the  general  interest  of  truth.  If  to  be 
silent  out  of  a  legitimate  deference  to  the  preju- 
dices of  his  congregation  involve  the  defeat  of 
a  cause  which  he  honestly  believes  to  be  the 
cause  of  Christian  truth,  because  at  a  perilous 
juncture  when  all  support  is  needed  to  secure 
victory,  no  help  comes  from  a  quarter  whence  it 
ought  to  have  been  forthcoming,  how  can  the 
preacher  be  acquitted  of  cowardice  and  disloy- 
alty? In  that  strenuous  age  of  rehgious  con- 
flict, the  seventeenth  century,  when  honest  men 
had  to  take  their  side  and  run  all  risks  with  the 
truth,  no  text  was  more  often  on  the  lips  of 
preachers  than  that  fierce  cry  of  the  Hebrew 
prophetess,  which  invoked  the  curse  of  God  on 
those  cautious  and  time-serving  Israehtes  who  at 
a  desperate  crisis  of  the  national  fortunes  came 
not  to  the  help  of  the  Lord  against  the  mighty. 
It  may  be  the  preacher's  clear  duty  to  cast  "re- 
serve" aside,  to  provoke  the  resentment  of  alarmed 
prejudice,  to  brave  the  suspicions  of  terrified 
ignorance,  to  accept  with  eyes  open  the  aliena- 
tion of  followers,  and  court  professional  failure 
in  the  service  of  imperilled  hberty.  There  is  a 
place  for  chivalry  in  the  Christian  preacher's 
life,  and  in  the  campaigns  of  Christ  there  are 
forlorn  hopes  to  be  led. 

Great  is  the  facile  conqueror: 
Yet  haply  he,  who,  wounded  sore, 


136      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

Breathless,  unhorsed,  all  covered  o'er 

With  blood  and  sweat, 
Sinks  foiled,  but  fighting  evermore,  — 

Is  greater  yet. 

There  is  a  solidarity  of  spiritual  interest  amid 
all  the  distinctions  of  sect  and  creed,  and  no  for- 
tune of  truth  in  any  part  of  the  Christian  society 
can  be  unimportant  to  any  other.  Patriotism  is 
a  sentiment  which  overrides  local  attachments, 
and  it  has  its  spiritual  analogue  in  that  "anxiety 
for  all  the  churches,"  which  S.  Paul  confessed, 
and  which  belongs  in  measure  to  every  man  who 
stands  in  his  pastoral  succession. 

It  will  be  sufficiently  apparent  that  the  modern 
preacher  must  be  no  mean  casuist  if  he  is  to  steer 
a  straight  course  between  the  opposite  perils  of 
undue  self-assertion  and  disloyal  self-suppres- 
sion. The  casuistic  problem  is  never  remote  or 
theoretical.  It  confronts  him  every  time  he 
makes  use  of  the  Bible  to  prove  a  doctrine  or 
illustrate  an  argument.  A  few  examples  will 
best  exhibit  its  nature  and  importance.  We  may 
take  two  cases  both  familiar  and  both  extremely 
difficult  —  the  use  of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  and  the 
treatment  of  the  evangelical  eschatology. 

Let  us  assume  the  not  uncommon  case  of  a 
preacher  who  is  sufficiently  acquainted  with  the 
protracted  discussions  as  to  the  authorship  and 
character  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  to  know  that  even 
the    most     thoroughgoing    orthodoxy,    provided 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       137 

only  it  be  learned,  acknowledges  a  great  embar- 
rassment in  defending  the  traditional  views  on 
these  subjects.  Let  us  assume  further  that,  as 
the  result  of  his  reading  and  reflection,  he  is 
convinced  that  the  Fourth  Gospel  (whether  the 
work  of  the  Apostle  John  or  not)  cannot  properly 
be  regarded  as  historical;  that  the  discourses  are, 
on  the  most  favourable  hypothesis,  an  amalgam 
of  reminiscences  and  interpretations  which  defies 
analysis;  that  the  miraculous  narratives  are 
rather  didactic  parables  than  records  of  actual 
occurrences;  that  the  picture  of  our  Lord  pre- 
sented throughout  is  not  so  much  drawn  from 
life  as  designed  to  express  the  spiritual  signifi- 
cance of  His  person,  and  to  utter  the  spiritual 
truth  which  the  author's  experience  had  dis- 
closed and  verified.  It  will,  I  think,  be  admitted 
that  such  a  view  would  pass  as  moderate  in  the 
critical  world;  that  it  is  probable  in  itself;  that  it 
is  weightily  maintained;  that  it  is  not  inconsistent 
with  a  genuine  discipleship,  or  necessarily  incom- 
patible with  an  orthodox  Christology:  that  in 
point  of  fact  it  is  in  substance  accepted  by  many 
preachers  of  undoubted  soundness  in  the  faith. 
Take  such  a  conservative  estimate  of  the  Gospel  as 
that  set  forth  by  Dr.  Sanday  in  his  most  valuable 
and  interesting  "Morse  Lectures"  on  "The 
Criticism  of  the  Fourth  Gospel"  dehvered  at 
New  York  in  the  autumn  of  1904,  and  you  will 
find    sufficient    departure    from    the    traditional 


138       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

position  to  raise  the  preacher's  problem  which  we 
are  discussing.  Of  the  discourses  we  are  told 
that  probably  the  evangelist  "did  not  discrim- 
inate, or  even  try  to  discriminate,"  between  his 
own  words  and  those  of  Christ;  that  "there  is 
no  reason  to  suppose"  that  he  would  "feel  obhged 
to  ask  himself  whether  the  words  which  he  was 
setting  down  were  really  spoken  or  not";  that 
"the  consequence  is  that  historical  recollections 
and  interpretative  reflection,  the  fruit  of  thought 
and  experience,  have  come  down  to  us  inextri- 
cably blended";  that  the  author's  mind  "has  in- 
sensibly played  upon"  his  recollections,  "and 
shaped  them,  and  worked  up  in  them  the  fruits 
of  his  own  experience."  Of  the  miraculous 
narratives  Dr.  Sanday  speaks  with  a  kind  of 
reluctant  candour,  and  with  something  Hke  con- 
scious embarrassment: 

"It  must  be  confessed  that  the  miracles  in  the 
fourth  Gospel,  while  in  the  main  they  run  par- 
allel to  those  in  the  synoptic  Gospels,  yet  do  ap- 
pear to  involve  a  certain  heightening  of  the  effect. 
The  courtier's  servant  is  healed  from  a  distance; 
the  impotent  man  has  been  thirty-and-eight  years 
in  his  infirmity;  the  blind  man  who  was  sent  to 
wash  in  the  pool  of  Siloam  had  been  blind  from 
his  birth;  Lazarus  had  lain  four  days  in  the 
tomb.  Not  only  do  these  details  imply  an  en- 
hancement of  the  supernatural,  but  it  seems  that 
the  author  of  the  Gospel  valued  them  especially 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      139 

for  that  reason.  They  fall  in  entirely  with  his 
purpose  in  writing.  He  sees  in  them  so  many 
striking  illustrations  of  the  glory  of  the  Christ. 
He  had  been  himself  keenly  on  the  watch  for  the 
manifestations  of  that  glory,  and  he  delighted  to 
record  them  in  the  hope  that  they  might  impress 
his  readers  as  they  had  impressed  him.''^ 

This  passage  does  not  seem  very  illuminating, 
or  even  quite  consistent.  To  "heighten  effects" 
and  "enhance  the  supernatural"  are  only  con- 
ceivable as  the  procedures  of  an  eye-witness 
"recording"  what  he  has  seen,  if  we  suppose 
that  he  was  more  eager  to  edify  than  to  speak 
the  truth.  Dr.  Sanday  admits  the  special  diffi- 
culty attaching  to  the  narrative  of  the  raising  of 
Lazarus,  and,  avoiding  more  siw  any  definite 
pronouncement,  embarks  on  a  long  and  embar- 
rassed discussion  of  the  treatment  of  miracle. 
His  position  is  sufficiently  set  forth  in  the  follow- 
ing passage: 

"We  are  not  called  upon  to  believe  that  any- 
thing is  really  contrary  to,  or  in  violation  of, 
nature.  .  .  .  AVe  can  always  exercise  an  act  of 
faith,  that  if  we  really  knew  what  had  taken 
place,  and  if  we  really  knew  the  highest  laws  of 
the  universe,  there  would  not  be  any  contradic- 
tion between  them.  As  it  is,  there  is  a  double 
margin  of  error:  it  is  difficult,  and  in  many  cases 
impossible,  for  us  so  to  translate  the  language  of 
the  distant  past  into  the  idiom  of  the  present  as 


I40       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

to  be  sure  that  we  can  realize  what  are  the  facts 
that  we  have  to  deal  with;  and,  even  if  we  had 
got  the  facts,  we  should  still  have  but  a  very  im- 
perfect knowledge  of  the  causes  by  which  they 
were  determined. 

"We  speak,  therefore,  not  of  what  we  know, 
but,  as  I  have  said,  by  an  act  of  faith,  of  that 
which  would  be  if  we  knew.  In  this  attitude  we 
make  allowance  for  possible  and  probable  defects 
in  our  sources;  we  make  allowance  for  all  the 
disturbing  influences  that  have  brought  them 
into  the  shape  in  which  we  see  them.  But  in 
doing  this,  we  have  the  consolation  of  feeling 
that  any  element  of  mistake  that  has  come  in 
under  this  head  has  been  all  of  the  nature  of 
extension.  The  miracles  of  primitive  Christian- 
ity are  certainly  not  a  series  of  fictions.  There 
certainly  was  among  them  a  large  nucleus  of 
events  that  really  had  the  character  claimed  for 
them,  that  were  really  due  to  the  operation  of  a 
Divine  cause,  and  really  bore  witness  to  the 
presence  of  such  a  cause.  If  there  was  anything 
beyond  this  of  a  less  trustworthy  character,  we 
may  be  sure  that  it  was  framed  on  the  analogy  of 
that  which  is  verifiable,  or  that  would  be  veri- 
fiable if  we  possessed  instruments  and  methods 
capable  of  dealing  with  it."^ 

I  have  quoted  the  whole  passage  in  order  that 
the  author's  position  might  be  fairly  presented, 

iPage  177. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       141 

and  it  will  be  seen  that  he  is  in  a  quandary,  un- 
able to  affirm  the  historicity  of  the  miraculous 
narratives,  and  unwiUing  to  deny  it.  This  atti- 
tude of  suspended  judgment,  however,  does  not 
widely  commend  itself  to  critical  scholars,  and  is 
of  course  repugnant  to  the  instincts  of  the  older 
orthodoxy.  Scholars  for  the  most  part  agree  in 
an  estimate  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  which  excludes 
both  apostohc  authorship  and  historical  charac- 
ter. Such  an  estimate,  moreover,  is  from  the 
preacher's  point  of  view  perfectly  legitimate,  and 
any  preacher  who  adopted  it  would  be  within 
his  rights.  Nevertheless  he  would  find  the  cas- 
uistic problem  implicit  in  the  use  of  the  Gospel 
the  more  difficult.  But  even  in  so  mild  a  ver- 
sion as  that  which  Dr.  Sanday  has  sanctioned, 
the  critical  estimate  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  places 
the  conscientious  preacher  in  a  situation  of  per- 
plexity and  embarrassment.  How  far  can  he 
honestly  assume  in  the  pulpit  that  historical 
character  in  the  narratives,  and  that  Dominical 
authority  in  the  discourses,  which  ex  hypothesi 
he  himself  rejects?  How  far  is  he  free  to  quote, 
as  spoken  by  Christ  Himself,  words  which 
certainly  were  those  of  the  evangelist,  to  whom 
also  partly  or  wholly  must  be  ascribed  the 
sense  they  are  designed  to  bear?  How  far 
may  he  secure  for  his  arguments  a  support 
which  is  greater  than  he  himself  can  see  that 
they   are   entitled    to    receive,   when    he    allows 


142       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

his  hearers  to  ascribe  the  supreme  authority  of 
the  Lord  to  proof-texts,  which  he  knows  to  be 
only  very  indirectly  and  even  doubtfully  Domin- 
ical? If  he  conceive  himself  bound  to  a  course 
of  complete  doctrinal  sincerity,  and  attempt  to 
indicate  the  precise  measure  of  authority  which 
he  attaches  to  the  passages  he  quotes,  he  will 
find  himself  immersed  in  great  difficulties. 
How  shall  he  avoid  inflicting  a  deep  and  danger- 
ous wound  on  sincere  though  ignorant  behevers, 
whose  simple  faith  has  fastened  on  the  evan- 
gehst's  words,  and  clothed  them  with  the  full 
authority  of  Christ?  How  shall  he  make  sure 
that  his  confessed  departure  from  the  immemorial 
tradition  of  the  Christian  Church  will  not  be 
interpreted  as  the  token  of  an  unconfessed 
departure  from  the  Christian  faith  itself?  May 
he  not  in  his  endeavour  to  be  perfectly  sincere 
make  sad  the  Lord's  people,  whom  he  is  com- 
missioned to  comfort,  and  put  weapons  in  the 
hands  of  the  Lord's  adversaries,  whom  he  is 
charged  to  rebuke?  These  questions  are  im- 
possible to  avoid,  and  infinitely  difficult  to  answer. 
The  preacher  will  not  lack  persuasive  induce- 
ments to  a  safer  course,  yet  even  so  he  will  not 
escape  from  his  embarrassment.  If,  listening 
to  the  suggestions  of  pastoral  charity  and  pro- 
fessional caution,  he  permit  himself  to  adopt 
conventional  modes  of  speech,  and  to  quote  the 
Gospel  in  the  accustomed  way,   how   is  he  to 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      143 

avoid  a  disabling  sense  of  insincerity,  or  escape 
the  risk  of  alienating  by  his  apparent  lack  of 
candour  those  of  his  hearers  who  are  educated 
and  perplexed  ?  Shall  he  take  refuge  in  the 
fact  that,  whatever  may  be  the  precise  relation 
of  the  Johannine  discourses  to  Christ,  they  are 
the  oldest,  most  authoritative,  and  most  illumi- 
nating commentaries  on  His  teaching  which 
the  Church  possesses,  and  base  on  it  the  assur- 
ance that  no  spiritual  mischief  can  really  come 
from  leaving  undisturbed  the  conviction,  that 
those  discourses  are  in  letter  and  form  what 
they  certainly  are  in  general  effect,  the  Saviour's 
message  of  truth?  There  are,  perhaps,  two 
answers  which  may  be  returned  to  this  question. 
On  the  one  hand,  it  may  be  urged  that  to  clothe 
the  commentary  with  the  authority  of  the  text 
is  really  to  make  essential  to  discipleship  a 
specific  Christology  —  for  the  Johannine  dis- 
courses are  the  careful  elaboration  of  a  specific 
Christology  —  and  thereby  to  misconceive  dan- 
gerously the  very  nature  of  discipleship.  On 
the  other  hand,  it  may  be  argued  that  grave 
risks  to  faith  are  latent  in  every  religious  proced- 
ure, which,  however  innocent  in  design  and 
apparently  expedient,  really  implies  a  measure  of 
dupHcity.  Sooner  or  later  men  come  to  know 
that  they  had  been  permitted  to  continue  in 
error  by  those  whom  they  had  accepted  as  their 
spiritual   guides;   they  find   themselves  indebted 


144      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

to  others  for  information  which  they  justly  con- 
sider they  were  entitled  to  receive;  an  universal 
suspicion  invades  the  resentful  mind  of  the  dis- 
illusioned disciple,  and  a  transition,  which  might 
have  been  traversed  with  no  greater  loss  than 
that  of  a  few  pious  opinions,  becomes  the  occa- 
sion of  the  forfeiture  of  the  whole  capital  of 
faith.  One  circumstance  there  is,  indeed,  which 
ought  to  clear  the  preacher's  mind,  and  make 
plain  the  path  of  his  duty.  If  an  attempt  should 
be  made,  in  the  case  of  others  more  candid  or 
less  cautious  than  himself,  to  suppress  by  the 
strong  hand  of  authority  the  exercise  of  a  doc- 
trinal Hberty,  which  he  must  needs  insist  upon, 
he  can  have  no  doubt  as  to  his  action.  He  must 
seek  no  evasion  of  responsibihty,  and  make  no 
concealment  of  personal  belief.  At  all  hazards 
he  must  speak  out,  and  take  the  side  of  imperilled 
freedom. 

The  casuistic  problem  of  the  preacher's  duty 
is  not  less  perplexing  if  we  take  the  case  of  the 
evangehcal  eschatology.  I  need  not  point  out 
that  nowhere  have  the  traditional  beliefs  been 
more  remarkably  altered.  We  know  that  the 
eschatology  of  the  New  Testament  stands  in 
the  closest  relation  with  current  Jewish  behefs, 
and  receives  remarkable  illustration  from  that 
strange  apocalyptic  literature,  which  the  learn- 
ing and  industry  of  Dr.  Charles  have  made 
famihar  to  the  EngUsh-speaking  student.    More- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       145 

over,  we  perceive  that  the  New  Testament  does 
not  contain  a  complete,  or  even  a  consistent,  doc- 
trine. The  student  must  distinguish  between 
the  teaching  of  the  synoptics  and  that  of  the 
fourth  evangeHst;  between  different  phases  of 
the  Pauhne  doctrine;  between  S.  Paul's  teaching 
and  that  of  the  Apocalypse.  It  is  hard  to  dis- 
criminate between  the  different  elements  of  the 
evangehcal  tradition.  It  is  all,  of  course,  as- 
cribed to  our  Lord,  but  some  of  it  is  clearly  to 
be  attributed  to  the  evangehsts;  some  expresses 
the  behefs  and  expectations  of  the  apostolic 
church;  some  may  be  borrowed  from  non-Chris- 
tian sources.  We  cannot  forget  that  on  the 
crucial  question  of  the  nature  and  time  of  the 
Parousia,  the  Apostles  were  mistaken;  and  we 
evidently  must  seek  for  the  truth  through  the 
difficult  medium  of  symbohsm.  All  these  cir- 
cumstances contribute  to  the  preacher's  embar- 
rassment when  he  handles  the  great  theme. 
There  is  no  part  of  the  Christian  scheme  which 
has  taken  a  deeper  hold  on  the  conscience  and 
imagination  of  Christendom,  and  the  rehgious 
convictions  of  average  folk  are  most  intimately 
bound  up  with  a  materiahstic  literahsm,  intol- 
erable to  the  scholar.  It  is  sufficient  to  allude 
to  the  popular  hymns  which  treat  of  the  "Four 
Last  Things."  They  are  so  many  paraphrases 
of  the  Apocalyptic  symbolic  descriptions,  con- 
ceived  of  as   Hteral  occurrences.     MediaevaUsm 


146      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

has  in  this  sphere  never  lost  its  hold  over  us. 
The  "Dies  Iras,"  perhaps  the  noblest  utterance 
of  mediaeval  piety,  is  still  sung  in  our  churches. 
It  is  nothing  but  the  description  of  the  Apoca- 
lyptist  drawn  out  in  detail,  pointed  with  a  per- 
sonal reference,  and  suffused  with  the  medieval 
spirit  of  intense  terror.  Christian  sentiment 
has  clothed  with  alluring  beauty  notions  of  intol- 
erable crudeness.  I  am  tempted  to  quote  a 
passage  from  Cardinal  Newman's  sermon  on 
the  resurrection  of  the  body: 

"We  cannot  determine  in  what  exact  sense  our 
bodies  will  be  on  the  Resurrection  the  same  as 
they  are  at  present,  but  we  cannot  harm  ourselves 
by  taking  God's  declaration  simply,  and  acting 
upon  it.  And  it  is  as  believing  this  comfortable 
truth  that  the  Christian  Church  put  aside  that 
old  irreverence  of  the  funeral  pile,  and  conse- 
crated the  ground  for  the  reception  of  the  saints 
that  sleep.  We  deposit  our  departed  friends 
calmly  and  thoughtfully  in  faith;  not  ceasing  to 
love  or  remember  that  which  once  lived  among 
us,  but  marking  the  place  where  it  Hes,  as  believ- 
ing that  God  has  set  His  seal  upon  it,  and  His 
Angels  guard  it.  His  Angels,  surely,  guard  the 
bodies  of  His  servants;  Michael  the  Archangel, 
thinking  it  no  unworthy  task  to  preserve  them 
from  the  powers  of  evil.  Especially  those  like 
Moses  who  fall  'in  the  wilderness  of  the  people,' 
whose  duty  has  called  them  to  duty  and  suffering, 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       147 

and  who  die  a  violent  death,  these,  too,  if  they 
have  eaten  of  that  incorruptible  bread  [i.e.,  the 
Eucharist],  are  preserved  safe  till  the  last  day. 
There  are,  who  have  not  the  comfort  of  a  peace- 
ful burial.  They  die  in  batde,  or  on  the  sea,  or 
in  strange  lands,  or  as  the  early  behevers,  under 
the  hands  of  persecutors.  Horrible  tortures,  or 
the  mouths  of  wild  beasts,  have  e'er  now  dis- 
honoured the  sacred  bodies  of  those  who  had 
fed  upon  Christ;  and  diseases  corrupt  them 
still.  This  is  Satan's  work,  the  expiring  efforts 
of  his  fury,  after  hfs  overthrow  by  Christ. 
Still,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  we  repair  these  insults 
of  our  enemy,  and  tend  honourably  and  piously 
those  tabernacles  in  which  Christ  has  dwelt. 
And  in  this  view,  what  a  venerable  and  fearful 
place  is  a  church,  in  and  around  which  the  dead 
are  deposited!  Truly  it  is  chiefly  sacred  as 
being  the  spot  where  God  has  for  ages  mani- 
fested Himself  to  His  servants;  but  add  to  this 
the  thought,  that  it  is  the  actual  resting-place 
of  those  very  servants,  through  successive  times, 
who  still  live  unto  Him.  The  dust  around  us 
will  one  day  become  animate.  We  may  ourselves 
be  dead  long  before,  and  not  see  it.  We  our- 
selves may  elsewhere  be  buried,  and  should  it  be 
our  exceeding  blessedness  to  rise  to  life  eternal, 
we  may  rise  in  other  places,  far  in  the  east  or 
west.  But,  as  God's  word  is  sure,  what  is 
sown  is  raised;  the  earth  to  earth,  ashes  to  ashes, 


148      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

dust  to  dust,  shall  become  glory  to  glory,  and 
life  to  the  living  God,  and  a  true  incorruptible 
image  of  the  spirit  made  perfect.  Here  the  saints 
sleep,  here  they  shaU  rise.  A  great  sight  will  a 
Christian  country  then  be,  if  earth  remains  what 
it  is;  when  holy  places  pour  out  the  worshippers 
who  have  for  generations  kept  vigil  therein, 
waiting  through  the  long  night  for  the  bright 
coming  of  Christ!  And  if  this  be  so,  what  pious 
composed  thought  should  be  ours  when  we  enter 
churches!  God  indeed  is  everywhere,  and  His 
Angels  go  to  and  fro;  yet  can  they  be  more  worth- 
ily employed  in  their  condescending  care  of  man, 
than  where  good  men  sleep?  In  the  service  of 
the  Communion  we  magnify  God  together  with 
Angels  and  Archangels,  and  all  the  company  of 
heaven.  Surely  there  is  more  meaning  in  this 
than  we  know  of;  what  a  'dreadful'  place  would 
this  appear  if  our  eyes  were  opened  as  those  of 
Elisha's  servant!  'This  is  none  other  than  the 
house  of  God,  and  this  is  the  gate  of  heaven.'"^ 
The  felicitous  choice  of  words  may  easily  con- 
ceal the  strange  crudity  of  the  notions  sacramental 
and  eschatological  which  they  express;  yet  a 
little  reflection  will  soon  make  evident  how 
exceedingly  crude  those  notions  are.  Newman, 
in  spite  of  his  subtle  and  powerful  intellect, 
thought  and  wrote  on  these  subjects  with  the 
naive    simplicity    of    a    mediaeval    monk.    The 

*  "Parochial  Sermons,"  vol.  I,  p.  321. 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       149 

masses  of  Protestant  Christians  are  still  intensely 
and  intractably  materialistic  in  their  eschatolog- 
ical  beliefs;  and  the  serious  aspect  of  the  fact 
is  that  which  shows  these  materialistic  beliefs 
associated  so  closely  as  to  appear  inseparable 
with  the  fundamental  truths  of  moral  responsi- 
bility, of  Divine  self-vindication  in  Judgment, 
of  the  inexorable  perdition  which  follows  on  per- 
sistent sin,  of  the  final  triumph  of  righteousness. 
These  fundamental  truths  it  is  the  first  duty  of 
the  preacher  to  insist  upon,  to  defend,  to  sever 
from  compromising  connexions  with  material- 
ism, to  apply  to  the  conditions  of  individual 
lives.  How  shall  he  so  handle  the  sacred  text 
as  to  disallow  the  literalism  which  has  built  on 
it  such  an  immense  fabric  of  materialistic  dogma, 
and  not  in  the  process  to  weaken  its  hold  on  the 
minds  of  men?  The  mere  attempt  is  full  of 
risk,  for  here  the  prejudices  of  religious  people 
are  fiercest  and  most  intractable.  I  have 
selected  the  cases  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  and  the 
evangelical  eschatology  because  they  will  be 
within  the  experience  of  most  preachers,  not 
because  they  are  in  any  special  sense  more  per- 
plexing than  other  cases  which  might  be  sug- 
gested. Enough  has  been  said  to  make  clear 
the  nature  and  the  gravity  of  the  casuistic  prob- 
lem of  the  preacher's  use  of  the  Bible  in  the 
circumstances  of  our  time.  It  is  indeed  com- 
paratively easy  to  ignore  that  problem,  to  prefer 


I50      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

professional  success  to  the  risks  and  toils  of  con- 
flict, to  appeal  to  the  devotional  sentiments  of 
congregations  which  are  still  for  the  most  part 
unconscious  of  the  religious  revolution  which  is 
in  progress  around  them,  to  avoid  by  self-immer- 
sion in  irrelevant  activities,  social  and  political, 
the  necessity  of  awaking  the  fears  and  rebuking 
the  prejudices  of  intense  but  ignorant  piety. 
These  are  no  easy  times  for  Christian  preachers. 
We  are  still  only  at  the  beginning  of  the  great 
transition  out  of  mediasvalism,  and  there  lies 
before  us  a  long  and  troubled  interval  of  theo- 
logical disintegration  before  a  satisfactory  and 
lasting  reconstruction  of  Christian  belief  can  be 
effected.  Let  no  man  think  that  the  historic 
method  of  spiritual  progress  has  changed.  The 
cause  of  truth  has  never  yet  prevailed  without 
martyrdoms,  and  these  cannot  be  wanting 
now.  On  the  sincerity  and  courage  of  Chris- 
tian preachers  much  depends  —  the  help  of 
distressed  souls  drifting  from  the  old  doctrinal 
moorings  over  a  dark  and  trackless  ocean  and 
beginning  to  despair  of  any  anchorage  for  faith; 
the  faithful  teaching  of  the  congregations,  pa- 
tiently, tactfully,  faithfully,  in  spite  of  suspicion 
and  abuse;  above  all,  the  resolute  determination 
never  to  be  driven  by  the  violence  of  bigotry 
within  the  Church,  or  the  force  of  secular  enthu- 
siasm without,  into  accepting  a  separation  of 
Christ's  religion  from  the   central   stream   of 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       151 

human  progress.  In  urging  that  unnatural  sev- 
erance the  uhramontane  and  the  secularist  join 
hands,  and  they  can  count  on  the  blinding  influ- 
ences of  religious  panic  and  prejudice.  Between 
them  and  their  sterilizing  victory  stands  the 
Christian  preacher,  "not  walking  in  craftiness, 
nor  handling  the  word  of  God  deceitfully;  but 
by  the  manifestation  of  the  truth  commending 
himself  to  every  man's  conscience  in  the  sight 
of  God." 


VI 


OF  SOCIAL  AND   POLITICAL  PREACHING 

Hitherto  we  have  dealt  only  with  the  strictly 
professional  aspects  of  the  preacher's  duty  as 
the  authorized  exponent  of  the  Christian  religion, 
and  the  interpreter  (in  that  capacity)  of  the 
Scriptures.  We  have  considered  the  restric- 
tions on  didactic  liberty  which  may  fairly  be 
thought  to  be  involved  in  his  own  discipleship, 
in  the  necessary  requirements  of  the  Church 
from  which  he  has  received  his  pastoral  com- 
mission, in  the  legitimate  claims  of  the  congre- 
gation to  which  he  ministers,  in  the  very  con- 
ditions of  successful  teaching.  Now  we  must 
take  into  reckoning  another  and  less  professional 
aspect  of  the  preacher's  ministry,  that  in  which 
he  appears  as  a  citizen  possessed  by  reason  of  his 
ofl&ce  of  exceptionally  great  opportunities  for 
forming  public  opinion  on  debated  questions 
which  are  not  necessarily  or  obviously  within  the 
range  of  his  official  duty.  Economic,  social,  and 
political  questions  are  keenly  debated  in  every 
community  which  is  both  civilized  and  free,  and 
the  Christian  clergy  cannot  ignore  them.  Three 
152 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       153 

cogent  reasons  combine  to  compel  the  most 
reluctant  preacher  to  inquire  what  his  personal 
obligation  may  be.  First,  as  a  Christian  man 
whose  action  is  clothed  with  a  certain  exemplary 
significance  beyond  that  of  the  ordinary  Chris- 
tian, he  must  determine  his  own  social  and  politi- 
cal action;  next,  as  a  Christian  teacher,  he  can- 
not ignore  the  intimate  and  indeed  vital  connection 
between  rehgious  convictions  and  the  secular  pro- 
cedures through  which  they  must  find  expression : 
finally,  as  a  Christian  citizen  set  in  public  place 
and  thereby  enabled  to  help  or  hinder  conspicu- 
ously the  cause  of  social  righteousness,  he  cannot 
absolve  himself  from  responsibility  for  the  use 
or  disuse  of  his  exceptional  opportunities.  In 
this  triple  character,  as  Christian  men,  as  Chris- 
tian teachers,  and  as  prominent  Christian  citi- 
zens, the  clergy  of  the  Christian  Churches  are 
driven  to  consider  the  difficult  and  exasperating 
questions  which  agitate  the  society  to  which  they 
are  commissioned  in  Christ's  Name.  What  is 
the  bearing  of  all  this  on  their  preaching?  How 
far  may  they  give  free  expression  in  the  pulpit 
to  their  personal  opinions  on  the  burning  ques- 
tions of  economics  and  politics?  Ought  they  to 
hold  their  peace  in  the  midst  of  public  perplexity 
and  excitement,  and  repudiate  for  themselves  the 
liberty  of  speech  which  every  other  citizen  pos- 
sesses? Is  self-suppression  or  self-expression  the 
Christian  preacher's  duty? 


154      THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

It  is  important  to  observe  that  the  situation 
in  these  respects  also  is  novel.  Christian  history 
hardly  offers  precedents  for  our  guidance,  for  in 
the  past,  though  there  has  been  abundance  of 
political  preaching,  it  has  always  been  either 
inspired  or  authoritative.  There  have  been 
prophets  speaking  by  the  title  of  an  immediate 
and  recognized  inspiration;  and  there  have 
been  ordained  exponents  of  public  policies, 
speaking  in  the  name  of  civil  or  ecclesiastical 
Government,  as  the  case  may  be.  The  formula 
of  the  priest,  "Thus  saith  the  Church,"  has  re- 
placed the  older  formula  of  the  prophet,  "Thus 
saith  the  Lord."  The  formula  of  Protestant 
nationahsm,  "Thus  saith  the  King,  or  the  State, 
or  the  Law,"  is  really  only  a  variation  of  the 
priestly  formula,  implying  indeed  a  different  con- 
ception of  the  Church,  but  not  affecting  the 
authoritative  or  official  character  of  the  teaching 
thus  introduced.  The  Protestant  reformers  stood 
in  a  somewhat  ambiguous  position.  They  had  no 
immediate  or  recognized  inspiration  to  appeal  to; 
and  at  least  in  the  earlier  phases  of  the  Reforma- 
tion they  were  in  open  revolt  against  the  author- 
ity both  of  Church  and  State.  In  appealing  to 
the  Bible  they  commonly  imagined  themselves 
to  be  appealing  to  a  Divine  and  infallible  author- 
ity, but  even  with  respect  to  purely  spiritual 
matters  their  appeal  was  really  to  the  conscience 
and  the  reason  of  mankind.    Their  own  private 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       155 

judgment  indeed  could  determine  the  meaning 
they  placed  on  the  sacred  text,  and  thus  fashion 
the  message  which  they  preached,  but  they  could 
only  win  for  that  message  the  acceptance  of  others 
by  securing  for  it  the  approbation  of  their  private 
judgment  also.  The  true  nature  of  their  appeal, 
however,  was  obscured  so  long  as  the  Bible  was 
universally  believed  to  express  the  Divine  WiU 
in  economics  and  politics  as  well  as  in  religion. 
The  preacher  with  his  schedule  of  proof-texts 
faced  his  hearers  with  a  quasi-prophetic  authority, 
and,  indeed,  commonly  imagined  himself  the 
true  successor  of  the  ancient  Prophets.  He 
claimed  for  his  political  doctrines  the  august 
character  of  Divine  revelations,  and  clothed  his 
private  opinions  with  the  awful  authority  of 
religious  truth.  As  soon,  however,  as  this  esti- 
mate of  Scripture  failed  to  command  acceptance, 
the  preacher  was  seen  to  have  no  better  creden- 
tials as  a  politician  or  an  economist  than  the 
rest  of  men;  his  opinions  might  be  uttered  in 
the  solemn  phraseology  of  the  pulpit,  but  they 
remained  his  opinions  still;  and  their  valid  claim 
on  other  men's  acceptance  was  solely  determined 
by  their  intrinsic  reasonableness. 

Moreover,  it  would  be  both  uncandid  and  un- 
reasonable to  ignore  the  fact,  to  which  on  every 
page  the  history  of  Christendom  bears  witness, 
that  no  sincerity  of  conviction  avails  to  exempt 
the  Christian  minister  from  the  dominion  of  class 


iS6       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

prejudices  and  class  ideals.  The  ordained  aris- 
tocrat may  borrow  from  his  profession  the  modes 
by  which  he  expresses  his  political  opinions,  but 
the  opinions  themselves  will  ordinarily  be  those 
of  his  class.  Middle-class  individualism  will 
reflect  itself  in  the  social  and  political  attitude 
of  the  middle-class  clergyman.  Peasants  in 
orders  will  utter  the  aspirations  and  echo  the 
prejudices  of  the  peasantry.  The  influence  of 
social  type  is  discernible  even  in  the  Prophets 
and  Apostles.  Amos  the  peasant  is  a  peasant  still 
when  he  speaks  in  the  Name  of  the  Lord;  that 
is,  he  reahzes  most  vividly  the  bearings  of  the 
Divine  Message  on  the  circumstances  of  his  own 
class.  Isaiah,  the  kinsman  of  kings,  has  the 
"grand  manner"  of  the  court.  Jeremiah  and 
EzEKiEL  prophesy  in  the  tone  and  manner  of  the 
priestly  class  from  which  they  sprang.  Similarly, 
the  large  tolerance  and  wide-ranging  plans  of 
S.  Paul  are  not  unconnected  with  the  fact  that 
of  all  the  Apostles  he  alone  was  a  Roman  citizen, 
by  birth  a  gentleman  and  by  education  a  scholar. 
The  rugged  morality  of  the  Galilean  peasant  is 
displayed  in  the  Epistle  of  S.  James,  and  the 
fierce  nationalism  of  a  Palestinian  Jew  receives 
Christian  forms  on  the  lips  of  the  Apocalyptic 
seer.  Christian  experience,  repeated  again  and 
again,  certifies  the  correspondence  between  the 
social  and  political  attitude  of  Christian  minis- 
ters and  their  class  types.     This  fact  again  stands 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       157 

in  evident  connection  with  another,  not  less  cer- 
tain and  perhaps  even  more  important.  As 
soon  as  the  conditions  of  Christian  life  became 
normal,  that  is,  after  the  "other  worldly"  fer- 
vours of  the  first  age  and  the  distractions  of 
chronic  persecution  had  passed  away,  the  clergy 
have  tended  to  attach  themselves  to  the  dominant 
poHtical  force  of  their  time.  Accordingly  their 
advocacy  has  been  at  the  service  of  the  most 
diverse  political  systems,  and  they  have  conse- 
crated with  their  benedictions  the  most  opposite 
social  ideals.  The  Roman  Empire,  the  feudal 
order,  the  national  monarchies,  the  reign  of  com- 
mercialism —  each  in  succession  has  fashioned 
the  Christian  ministry  to  its  will;  and  if  at  present 
there  is  a  disposition  visible  in  every  branch  of 
the  Church  to  attach  the  clergy  to  the  advocacy 
of  extreme  democratic  views,  we  cannot  reason- 
ably disconnect  it  from  the  fact,  that  the  working 
classes  are  everywhere  becoming  the  domi- 
nant political  force  of  our  time.  Both  these 
considerations  —  the  persistence  and  fashioning 
power  of  class  types  on  the  one  hand,  and  the 
parasitic  attitude  of  the  clergy  towards  political 
force  on  the  other  —  ought  to  be  present  in  our 
minds  when  we  set  ourselves  to  the  difficult  task 
of  determining  the  rightful  action  of  the  modern 
preacher  with  respect  to  the  social  and  pohtical 
conflicts  of  his  own  age.  At  least  there  is  a 
chastening  preliminary  process  to  which  he  must 


158       THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

subject  himself  before  he  takes  up  his  parable 
on  the  vexed  questions  of  politics.  He  must 
make  his  own  personal  equation,  and  issue  to 
the  public  the  expurgated  edition  of  his  opinions. 

There  are  besides  some  other  considerations 
which  must  not  be  omitted.  Before  appeahng 
to  the  precedents  of  history,  and  invoking  them 
in  justification  of  his  action,  the  modern  preacher 
should  at  least  realize  the  changes  which  have 
taken  place  in  the  social  position  of  the  clergy, 
and  in  the  political  importance  of  the  pulpit.  In 
his  remarkably  suggestive  httle  treatise  "On  the 
Constitution  of  the  Church  and  State  according  to 
the  Idea  of  each"  the  philosopher  Coleridge 
has  described  in  no  exaggerated  terms  the  older 
significance  of  the  clergy  in  the  scheme  of  the 
national  life: 

"This  class  comprised  the  learned  of  all  de- 
nominations, the  professors  of  all  those  arts  and 
sciences,  the  possession  and  application  of  which 
constitute  the  civilization  of  a  country.  Theology 
formed  only  a  part  of  the  objects  of  a  national 
Church.  The  theologians  took  the  lead,  indeed, 
and  deservedly  so ;  —  not  because  they  were 
priests,  but  because  under  the  name  of  theology 
were  contained  the  study  of  languages,  history, 
logic,  ethics,  and  a  philosophy  of  ideas;  because 
the  science  of  theology  itself  was  the  root  of  the 
knowledges  that  civilize  man,  and  gave  unity 
and  the  circulating  sap  of  Ufe  to  all  other  sciences; 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       159 

and  because  under  the  same  name  were  com- 
prised all  the  main  aids,  instruments,  and  ma- 
terials of  national  education.  Accordingly,  a 
certain  small  portion  of  the  functionaries  of  the 
Clerisy  were  to  remain  at  the  fountain  heads  of 
the  humanities,  cultivating  and  enlarging  the 
knowledge  already  possessed,  watching  over 
the  interest  of  physical  and  moral  science,  and 
the  instructors  of  all  the  remaining  more  numerous 
classes  of  the  order.  These  last  were  to  be  dis- 
tributed throughout  the  country,  so  as  not  to 
leave  even  the  smallest  integral  division  without 
a  resident  guide,  guardian,  and  teacher,  diffusing 
through  the  whole  community  the  knowledge  in- 
dispensable for  the  understanding  of  its  rights,  and 
for  the  performance  of  its  correspondent  duties."  ^ 
Coleridge  clearly  had  in  mind  mediaeval  con- 
ditions, but  his  words  retained  a  considerable 
element  of  truth  long  after  the  Reformation.  In 
the  seventeenth  century,  the  golden  age  of  Puri- 
tan preaching,  the  poHtical  importance  of  the 
English  clergy  must  have  been  very  considerable. 
The  greatest  part  of  all  learning  in  the  nation 
was  found  in  the  ranks  of  the  clergy.  The 
clerical  profession  was  the  most  numerous  and 
the  most  influential  of  all  the  professions.  It 
was  still  no  unusual  thing  for  the  greater  political 
offices  to  be  entrusted  to  the  higher  ecclesiastics. 
Bishop  Williams  was  Lord  Keeper:    his  rival, 

^v.  p.  14. 


i6o       THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

Archbisop  Laud,  was  for  years  practically  the 
first  minister  of  the  Crown;  Bishop  Juxon  was 
Lord  Treasurer.  The  action  of  the  seven  bishops 
in  James  II' s  reign  was  felt  to  have  a  decisive 
efifect  on  the  political  situation.  Religion  was 
unquestionably  the  highest  concern  of  the  nation, 
and  its  due  organization  was  the  principal  con- 
cern of  a  Christian  government.  The  very  no- 
tion of  a  non-religious  citizen  was  abhorrent  and 
almost  inconceivable.  Intolerance  was,  of  course, 
the  characteristic  of  the  time.  All  parties  found 
common  ground  in  the  assumption  that  error 
must  be  suppressed  with  the  strong  hand  of 
a  Christian  state.  A  few  persecuted  sectaries 
might  formulate  the  principle  of  toleration,  or  a 
latitudinarian  thinker  might  play  with  the  notion, 
but  mainly  all  were  agreed  in  the  right  and  duty 
of  persecution.  Now  the  moral  justification  of 
religious  persecution  is  the  assumption  that  theo- 
logical error  draws  in  its  train  social  and  political 
mischiefs  so  grave,  that  the  manifest  evils  of  sup- 
pression are  comparatively  trivial.  The  impor- 
tance attached  by  the  state  to  the  religion  of  the 
people  affected  the  preacher's  duty  indirectly  by 
ensuring  for  his  preaching  the  audience  of  the 
immoral  and  the  irrehgious.  It  is  interesting 
to  remember  that  the  number  of  communicants 
in  the  Church  of  England  at  the  beginning  of 
James  I's  reign  was  almost  exactly  the  same  as  it 
is  now,   although  in  the  three  centuries  which 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       i6i 

have  intervened  the  population  has  multiplied 
sevenfold.  At  the  earher  period,  owing  to  the 
action  of  the  state,  the  whole  population  was 
brought  to  Communion.  Inevitably  in  such  cir- 
cumstances the  social  and  political  importance 
of  the  clergy  was  very  great.  Sermons  were  the 
ordinary  vehicles  of  poUtical  information,  and 
preachers  were  the  recognized  exponents  of  public 
policy.  Education  was  Hmited:  the  mass  of 
the  people  were  unable  to  read  or  write;  the  parish 
church  was  commonly  the  only  place  of  public 
meeting  in  the  parish;  and  that  was  the  freest 
discussion  of  political  questions  which  they  heard 
from  the  pulpit.  The  noisy  interruptions  to 
which  preachers  were  exposed,  as  the  congrega- 
tion expressed  audibly  its  dissent  from  or  agree- 
ment with  the  opinions  it  heard,  were  natural 
consequences  of  the  frankly  political  character 
of  the  sermons.  Absence  of  provocations  to 
excitement  on  the  part  of  the  preacher  is  the  con- 
dition of  that  decorousness  of  modern  congre- 
gations which  is  in  our  eyes  so  seemly  and  natural. 
When  church  attendance  was  compulsory,  either 
by  statute  or  by  the  iron  coercion  of  public  opinion, 
the  preacher  could  be  reasonably  sure  that  what- 
ever malpractices  called  for  public  rebuke  were 
represented  in  the  congregation  by  the  respon- 
sible parties.  Accordingly  his  denunciations  of 
sin  had  a  fitness  and  relevancy  which  could  not 
possibly  have  attached  to  them  in  the  absence  of 


i62       THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

the  offenders  against  whom  they  were  primarily 
directed.  It  is  too  commonly  the  case  with  the 
modern  preacher  that  he  thunders  at  the  social 
faults  of  absentees,  a  process  which  manifestly 
can  be  of  httle  service  to  them,  and  may  well  be 
as  unwholesome  as  it  must  be  irrelevant  for  the 
actual  hearers. 

All  these  considerations  lead  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  modern  preacher  will  not  find  much 
trustworthy  guidance  from  the  precedents  of 
Christian  history,  and  may  be  dangerously  mis- 
led by  them.  He  must  face  the  problem  of  his 
duty  for  himself,  and  determine  his  course  as 
best  he  may  in  view  of  the  situation  which  actually 
confronts  him.  In  that  situation  three  salient 
features  disclose  themselves. 

In  the  first  place,  there  is  the  extreme  com- 
plexity of  economic  and  social  questions,  a  com- 
plexity which  disallows  the  bold  intuitions  and 
sweeping  methods  of  the  enthusiastic  amateur, 
and  demands  the  patient  labour  and  cautious 
experiment  of  the  scientific  expert.  That  clergy- 
man is  an  immodest  as  well  as  an  imprudent 
man  who  does  not  perceive  the  importance  of 
this,  and  its  bearing  on  his  conception  of  duty. 
He  cannot  ordinarily  be  more  than  an  amateur 
in  point  of  economic  knowledge,  and  he  has  no 
moral  right,  therefore,  to  speak  on  economic  sub- 
jects with  the  authority  of  an  expert,  yet,  if  he 
speak  at  all  on  such  subjects  from  the  pulpit,  he 


THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       163 

cannot  avoid  making  some  claim  to  speak  with 
authority.  It  has  been  urged  that,  however  defect- 
ive the  preacher's  equipment  of  technical  knowl- 
edge may  be,  his  pastoral  experience  will  in  many 
cases  bring  him  special  and  most  valuable  knowl- 
edge of  another  kind,  which  will  more  than  make 
amends  for  his  economic  deficiencies.  Here, 
perhaps,  we  may  detect  a  fallacy.  The  experi- 
ence of  the  pastor,  as  he  fulfils  his  duty  year  in 
and  year  out  in  the  homes  of  the  people,  will 
certainly  bring  him  face  to  face  with  the  lament- 
able consequences  of  economic  dislocation  and 
moral  wrong;  and  so  far  he  will  be  qualified  to 
speak  of  the  social  problem  with  the  power  of 
personal  knowledge,  and  with  the  moving  insist- 
ence of  personal  conviction.  He  will  be  an 
excellent  witness  before  a  Commission  of  Inquiry; 
and,  if  the  state  of  public  opinion  be  apathetic, 
and  the  public  conscience  be  unmoved,  he  will  be 
able  to  bring  both  to  a  healthier  state  by  public 
protests  which  glow  with  the  passion  of  righteous 
anger.  Neither  knowledge  of  the  extent  of  social 
evils,  however,  nor  the  most  intense  desire  to 
remedy  them,  is  equivalent  to  a  true  estimate  of 
their  causes  and  conditions,  or  a  clear  view  as 
to  the  means  of  removing  them.  It  must  be 
added,  that  so  far  is  the  former  from  being  iden- 
tical with  the  latter,  that  the  two  may  even  be 
in  conflict.  The  pastor's  experience  may  even 
disqualify  the  preacher  for  the  r61e  of  a  social 


i64      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

reformer,  disturbing  the  balance  of  his  judgment 
by  the  vehemence  of  the  sentiments  it  creates, 
and  indisposing  him  to  accept  those  patient  and 
tentative  procedures  which  yet  are  the  indis- 
pensable methods  of  any  sound  and  lasting 
reformation.  It  would  be  easy  to  collect  from 
the  history  of  Christian  philanthropy  examples 
of  the  lamentable  consequences  which  have  fol- 
lowed reforming  legislation  dictated  by  religious 
enthusiasm  unchecked  by  knowledge.  In  no 
sphere  is  the  old  adage  about  the  wise  existing  to 
remedy  the  blunders  of  the  good  more  impressively 
illustrated.  Preachers  have  no  creditable  record 
as  social  reformers,  and  for  this  very  reason,  that 
they,  beyond  other  men,  are  disposed  to  make 
sincerity  of  conviction  and  strength  of  feeling 
take  the  place  of  knowledge  and  prudence. 

In  the  next  place,  the  modern  preacher  cannot 
be  blind  to  the  fact  that  there  is  no  longer  the 
old  justification  for  his  interference  in  secular 
politics.  The  cause  of  social  and  economic  re- 
formation has  now  taken  its  place  in  the  forefront 
of  public  interest,  and  it  may  safely  be  assumed 
that  in  the  future  it  will  hold  a  commanding 
position  in  the  programmes  of  political  parties. 
It  is  mere  affectation  to  pretend  that  the  advo- 
cacy of  social  change  in  the  interest  of  the  poorer 
classes  will  expose  any  politician  to  public  odium 
or  professional  loss,  always  provided  that  the 
change  be  in  itself  consonant  with  reason  and 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       165 

justice.  It  would  be  truer  to  say,  that  no  shorter 
cut  to  popularity  lies  open  to  the  aspiring  politi- 
cian than  that  offered  by  a  policy  of  social  amelio- 
ration. PoUtical  extinction  is  the  recompense 
of  an  unsympathetic  attitude  towards  working- 
class  ideals.  From  all  this  it  jesults  that  social 
reform  has  definitely  moved  into  the  area  of  party 
politics.  Every  specific  project  of  change  is  a 
plank  in  the  platform  of  a  party,  and  its  public 
advocacy  necessarily  carries  the  suggestion  of 
political  partisanship.  The  preacher  has  to  re- 
member, not  only  that  there  is  no  longer  any 
real  need  for  his  efforts  in  the  pulpit  to  recom- 
mend a  cause  which,  in  principle,  is  approved  by 
all  political  parties,  but  also,  that  any  efforts  he 
may  make  will  inevitably  be  discounted  as  the 
product,  not  of  a  disinterested  zeal  for  righteous- 
ness, but  of  the  prosaic  and  familiar  temper  of 
partisanship.  The  applause  which  the  modern 
preacher  receives  when  he  makes  his  pulpit  the 
ally  and  adjunct  of  the  political  platform  is 
really  dictated  by  the  gratitude  of  partisans,  not 
by  the  approval  of  religious  men,  or  at  least,  since 
human  hearts  are  fertile  in  self-delusion  and 
human  motives  are  subtly  mingled,  the  one  senti- 
ment is  dangerously  confounded  with'  the  other. 

In  the  third  place,  the  preacher  cannot  shut 
his  eyes  to  that  materialistic  tendency  which  the 
new  zeal  for  social  improvement  at  once  reveals 
and  stimulates.    It  is  not,  of  course,  to  be  ques- 


i66       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

tioned  that  there  are  other  and  nobler  elements 
in  modern  secularism,  but  no  man  who  knows 
anything  of  human  nature,  or  has  any  acquaint- 
ance with  the  aims,  methods,  and  literature  of 
the  secularist  movement,  can  have  the  smallest 
doubt  that,  along  with  the  altruistic  enthusiasm 
of  individuals,  and  the  rightful  aspirations  of 
classes,  there  are  at  work  the  sinister  forces  of 
materialistic  appetite  and  vulgar  covetousness. 
The  atmosphere  of  the  twentieth  century  is  secu- 
larist, and  it  is  affecting  human  thought  and  action 
at  every  point.  In  a  remarkable  sermon  recently 
preached  to  the  imdergraduates  of  Oxford,  Pro- 
fessor Inge  has  called  attention  to  "the  acute 
secularizing  of  the  Christian  hope  as  shown  by 
the  practical  disappearance  of  'the  other  world' 
from  the  sermons  and  writings  of  those  who  are 
most  in  touch  with  the  thought  and  aspirations 
of  our  contemporaries."  In  a  passage  of  great 
power  and  beauty  he  shows  how  extreme  a  contra- 
diction of  the  Christian  attitude  is  implied  in 
this  change: 

''The  Gospel  has  never  been  so  preached  be- 
fore. From  the  time  of  the  first  martyrs  to  our 
own  day  the  Christian  has  always  felt  that  this 
world  is  not  his  home.  His  eyes  have  been  fixed 
on  the  curtain  which  hangs  between  us  and  the 
Beyond,  through  which,  as  he  believed,  stream 
forth  broken  rays  of  a  purer  light  than  ever  came 
from  the  sun.     In  all  the  changes  and  chances 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       167 

of  mortal  life  he  has  looked  for  the  city  that  hath 
foundations,  whose  builder  and  maker  is  God. 
He  has  enriched  his  mental  pictures  of  this  glori- 
ous home  with  all  the  fairest  and  noblest  images 
that  he  could  find  in  the  world  of  time  and  space, 
and  he  has  prayed  every  day  that  he  may  at  last 
be  admitted  to  the  never-ending  companionship 
of  saints  and  angels  in  that  eternal  world,  and 
to  the  beatific  vision  of  God  Himself,  Whom 
those  only  can  see  who  have  been  made  like  Him 
in  holiness.  And  along  with  these  hopes  he  has 
been  haunted  by  the  horror  of  perpetual  exile 
from  the  presence  of  God  —  a  doom  so  dread- 
ful that  not  even  by  recalling  all  the  ingenuities 
of  human  cruelty  can  we  realize  one  tithe  of  the 
suffering  that  the  soul  must  endure  when  it 
knows  what  it  has  lost.  However  pictured,  the 
eternal  world  has  been  hitherto  for  Christians 
the  real  world.  The  only  reality  which  belongs 
to  this  present  life  lies  in  the  mysterious  fact  that 
temporal  acts  have  eternal  issues  —  that  the  pur- 
poses of  God  and  the  irrevocable  destiny  of  men 
and  women  are  being  worked  out  on  this  shifting 
stage." 

This  conception  of  Christianity  is  shown  to 
be  beyond  all  question  that  which  Jesus  Christ 
Himself  requires: 

"The  essence  of  Christianity  is  a  transvalua- 
tion  of  all  values  in  the  light  of  our  Divine 
sonship  and  heavenly  citizenship.    The  first  Chris- 


1 68       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

tians  were  accused  of  turning  the  world  upside 
down ;  and  this  is  just  what  tlie  teaching  of  Christ 
does  if  the  average  man  sees  the  world  right  side 
up.  The  things  that  are  seen  are  temporal, 
fugitive,  relatively  unreal;  the  things  that  are  not 
seen  are  eternal,  real  in  their  changeless  activity 
and  inexhaustible  fulness  of  meaning.  Our 
Saviour  lived  Himself  in  the  presence  of  these 
timeless  realities  —  and,  so  living,  He  knew  that 
the  only  thing  that  matters  in  this  world  is  the  life 
or  soul,  which  is  here  on  its  trial,  passing  through 
its  earthly  pilgrimage  towards  weal  or  woe."  * 

This  position,  of  course,  easily  lends  itself  to 
the  distortion  of  asceticism,  but  it  is  not  really 
ascetic.  Tlie  fallacy  of  historic  asceticism  was 
the  assumption,  drawn  from  no  Christian  source, 
that  the  saving  discipline  of  the  soul  involved  the 
repudiation,  so  far  as  was  possible,  of  secular 
interests  and  relationships;  its  truth,  that  which 
gave  it  so  tenacious  a  hold  on  the  minds  of  good 
men,  lay  in  its  emphatic  assertion  of  the  intrinsic 
superiority  and  abiding  character  of  the  soul's 
life.  We  have  done  for  ever  with  the  fallacy: 
let  us  take  care  that  we  do  not  let  slip  the  truth. 
In  affirming  the  validity  of  temporal  interests  and 
relationships  let  us  be  sure  that  we  maintain  their 
subordination  to  the  concerns  of  the  Spirit.  Re- 
ligion, the  Religion  of  the  Incarnation  preemi- 
nently, must  reveal  itself  as  the  principle  of  moral 

^v.  "Guardian,"  November  18,  1908. 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING    169 

discipline,  and  the  power  of  moral  independence. 
The  Christian  preacher  cannot  ignore  this  when 
he  seeks  to  determine  his  duty.  He  must  take 
care  that  the  primary  purpose  of  his  ministry  be 
not  obscured  or  defeated  by  aspects  of  it  which 
are  secondary  and  accidental.  When  all  is  said, 
what  is  the  true  metier  of  the  Christian  preacher  ? 
Is  it  not  precisely  the  jealous  wardship  and  faith- 
ful proclamation  of  those  higher  truths  of  the 
spiritual  life  which,  just  because  they  are  indeed 
such,  are  ever  threatened  by  the  nearer  and  more 
insistent  claims  of  the  secular  life?  Must  not 
the  preacher's  distinctive  contribution  to  the 
final  solving  of  the  social  problem  be  found  in 
his  steady  witness,  in  season  and  out  of  season, 
by  word  and  by  example,  to  the  sovereignty  of 
the  Spirit  over  the  Flesh,  of  the  eternal  life  over 
the  life  temporal,  of  the  other  world  over  the 
world  present?  Is  he  not  set  to  hold  social  re- 
formers back  from  the  sin  which  most  easily 
besets  them,  to  keep  before  them  the  too  easily 
forgotten  truth  that  "not  without  celestial  ob- 
servations can  even  terrestrial  charts  be  accurately 
constructed"?  And  can  he  reasonably  hope  to 
do  this  if  he  descends  into  the  arena  of  political 
conflict,  and  faces  men  in  the  suspected  char- 
acter of  a  partisan? 

Here  I  shall  certainly  be  met  by  two  objections. 
First,  it  will  be  urged  that,  whatever  may  be  the 
right  course  in  theory,  in  practice  the  preacher 


I70      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

will  be  unable  to  abstain  from  active  association 
with  politics  save  at  the  prohibitive  cost  of  his 
public  influence.  Is  it  indeed  reasonable  to 
suppose  that  he  will  command  the  attention  of 
serious  citizens,  when  he  gives  them  to  under- 
stand that,  on  the  very  subjects  about  which 
they  feel  most  strongly,  and  with  respect  to  which 
their  reUgious  principles  cannot  but  be  directly 
concerned,  he  has  no  advice  or  encouragement  to 
offer?  Does  not  an  unavoidable  dilemma  con- 
front the  modern  preacher?  On  the  one  hand, 
loyalty  to  the  severely  spiritual  conception  of 
ministry  involving  loss  of  touch  with  his  hearers, 
and  perhaps  their  total  alienation;  on  the  other 
hand,  frank  acceptance  of  political  responsibility 
involving  the  discredit  of  partisanship  —  that  is 
the  choice,  a  choice  between  loss  of  influence  and 
lowering  of  influence. 

Next  it  will  be  claimed  that  in  point  of  fact 
situations  arise  in  which  abstention  from  an  active 
advocacy  of  a  given  policy  is  itself  equivalent 
to  active  opposition.  Such  an  issue  as  that 
which  confronted  the  American  clergy  half  a 
century  ago  is  an  illustration  which  will  immedi- 
ately rise  to  mind.  Was  Phillips  Brooks  mis- 
taken when  he  held  "that  it  was  the  duty  of  the 
Church  and  of  a  Christian  minister  to  sustain,  by 
sympathy,  by  act,  and  spoken  word,  the  govern- 
ment of  the  country  struggling  in  mortal  throes"  ?  * 

^v.  "Life,"  vol.  I,  p.  424. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       171 

It  must  of  course  be  admitted  that  the  preacher 
who  in  times  of  pohtical  excitement  declines  to 
be  swept  along  by  the  current  of  opinion  pre- 
vailing in  his  congregation,  will  run  no  slight 
risk  of  forfeiting  whatever  popularity  he  may 
have  acquired,  and,  if  spiritual  influence  be 
measured  by  popularity,  he  will  impair  his  spirit- 
ual influence.  The  inducements  to  pohtical  par- 
tisanship will  sometimes  be  very  strong,  and  they 
will  by  no  means  always  address  themselves  to 
the  weaker  elements  of  the  preacher's  character. 
No  mean  quahties  of  character  and  intellect  will 
be  needed  in  the  man,  who  will  vindicate  the 
true  independence  of  his  pulpit  against  the 
impetuous  force  of  denominational  or  congre- 
gational opinion,  or  the  more  subtle  pressure 
of  his  own  personal  conviction.  We  need  not 
wonder  that  in  many  churches,  especially  those 
which  are  organized  on  the  voluntary  principle, 
the  coercion  brought  to  bear  on  ministers  is  very 
great,  often  too  great  for  their  self-respect  and 
ministerial  duty.  Any  candid  observer  of  re- 
ligious Hfe  in  England  would,  I  think,  recognize 
in  the  pohtical  partisanship  of  the  Nonconformist 
clergy  a  fertile  source  of  spiritual  weakness.  I 
know,  of  course,  that  there  are  historical  extenua- 
tions which  can  be  pleaded.  The  long  conflict 
for  the  rights  of  citizenship  against  the  steady 
opposition  of  the  Established  Church  has  had 
effect  in  associating  religion  and  party  politics 


172       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

so  closely  together  that  their  separation  has 
appeared  unnatural;  but  now  that  the  reasons 
for  that  association  have  ceased  to  exist,  the 
fact  survives  to  the  grave  injury  of  religion. 
It  must  also  be  admitted  that  mere  abstinence 
from  polemical  language  in  the  pulpit  will  not  of 
itself  suffice  to  demonstrate  the  spiritual  inde- 
pendence of  the  preaching.  Reticence  in  the 
sermon  may  go  along  with  the  reputation  of 
partisanship;  and  there  are  occasions  when,  in 
the  very  interest  of  independence,  reticence  should 
be  abandoned.  There  is  needed  a  discipUned 
habit  in  the  preacher  if  his  preaching  is  to 
be  fairly  judged.  His  congregation  must  have 
learned  to  find  in  him  such  a  way  of  hving  and 
teaching  as  shall  make  his  attitude  of  aloofness 
in  preaching  appear  inevitable.  All  this  impHes 
no  slight  measure  of  effort  on  the  preacher's 
part.  He  will  have  to  say  with  the  Roman  cen- 
turion, ''With  a  great  sum  obtained  I  this 
hberty."  Much  honest  self-suppression,  much 
careful  disentanghng  of  fundamental  principles, 
much  resolute  contempt  for  conventional  judg- 
ments, much  patience  and  sympathy  and  tact,  will 
be  needed,  if  this  conduct  is  not  to  be  misunder- 
stood. The  habit  of  a  discriminating  charity 
cannot  affect  the  preaching  only;  it  must  be 
seen  to  rule  the  preacher's  ordinary  conduct.  If 
I  emphasize  this  point,  it  is  because  experience 
seems  to  show  that  the  preacher's  temperament 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       173 

is  not  often  favourable  to  discrimination  in  judg- 
ment or  to  moderation  in  speech.  At  every 
election  the  most  extravagant  examples  of  par- 
tisanship are  found  in  the  utterances  of  Christian 
ministers. 

"  Hard  cases  make  bad  law,"  is  a  legal  aphorism 
which  is  capable  of  many  applications,  and  among 
them  one  that  illumines  the  subject  of  our  present 
discussion.  Granting  frankly  that  at  intervals 
there  emerges  a  situation  in  which  the  duty  of 
every  honest  citizen,  and  therein  preeminently 
that  of  every  Christian  minister,  admits  of  no 
reasonable  doubt,  a  situation  in  which  issues  are 
in  such  wise  manifest,  that  it  must  be  plainly 
said  that  the  cause  of  righteousness  is  expressed 
by  one  side  of  a  controversy,  can  we  suppose  that 
this  extraordinary  state  of  things  can  provide 
precedents  for  the  direction  of  the  preacher's 
conduct  at  ordinary  times?  If  it  be  argued  that 
the  sole  judge  of  every  situation  must  be  the 
preacher  himself,  we  may  admit  the  fact,  and  only 
plead  that  the  preacher  should  base  his  decision 
on  a  reasonable  estimate  of  facts,  and  a  modest 
reckoning  of  his  own  competence. 

In  these  discussions  which  concern  procedures 
which  lie  outside  the  obvious  reference  of  his 
commission,  there  is  some  danger  that  the  preacher 
may  be  misled  by  that  identification  of  the  Church 
with  the  ministry,  which  has  so  deeply  and  so 
mischievously    affected     Christian    thought.     A 


174      THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

limitation  of  the  preacher's  hberty  in  the  treat- 
ment of  social  and  political  questions  is  easily 
represented  as  a  curtailment  of  the  range  of 
Christ's  influence,  as  if  an  artificial  bisection  of 
human  life  were  suggested,  and  on  one  side  of  the 
dividing  Hne  conduct  was  governed  by  Christian 
principles,  and  on  the  other  side  was  released 
from  their  control.  It  hardly  needs  that  I  should 
repudiate  so  monstrous  a  theory.  We  cannot  of 
course  assert  too  strongly  the  universality  of  the 
claim  of  Christ;  that  no  part  of  human  life 
lies  outside  the  regenerating  influence  of  the 
Incarnation;  that  every  human  career  seen  from 
the  vantage  ground  of  Christian  faith  is  Divinely 
ordained  to  be  in  its  degree  morally  redemptive. 
It  is  true,  and  cannot  be  too  much  insisted  upon, 
that  the  citizen  must  determine  his  civic  action 
by  the  Law  of  Christ;  that  his  conduct  in  business 
no  less  than  his  home  life  and  his  pubhc  worship 
must  be  governed  by  his  discipleship;  that  he  is 
called  to  a  complete  consecration  in  service.  May 
we  accumulate  the  functions  of  the  Christian 
society  on  the  Christian  ministry?  To  do  this 
is  the  radical  vice  of  sacerdotahsm.  Yet  surely 
nothing  less  than  the  transference  of  the  entire 
responsibility  of  the  Church  to  the  minister  is 
implicit  in  the  version  of  Ministerial  Duty  which 
is  assumed  by  much  modem  preaching.  He  is 
supposed  to  declare  with  authority  what  the 
Christian  law  demands  in  the  case  of  men  placed 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       175 

in  situations  of  which  he  can  hardly  fonn  a 
notion.  He  is  to  mark  out  for  the  employer  and 
for  the  workman  the  due  limits  of  duty;  to  deter- 
mine where  falls  the  line  between  honest  and 
dishonest  competition,  between  fair  and  unfair 
coercion,  between  the  payment  of  a  "living 
wage"  and  "sweating,"  between  a  legitimate 
profit  and  a  profit  that  is  a  veiled  robbery,  be- 
tween a  just  rent  and  an  excessive  rent,  between 
advertisement  that  a  Christian  man  may  use  and 
advertisement  which  he  may  not,  between  invest- 
ments which  do  not  violate  the  law  of  righteous- 
ness and  those  which  do,  between  political  methods 
which  befit  a  Christian  statesman  and  those  which 
do  not,  and  so  forth  ad  infinitum.  The  Christian 
minister  is  supposed  on  this  theory  of  his  duty 
to  stake  out  the  precise  requirements  of  disciple- 
ship  in  the  myriad  and  infinitely  various  situa- 
tions of  human  hfe.  The  Sermon  becomes  a 
"giving  of  the  Law,"  not  a  preaching  of  the 
Gospel.  It  is  an  effort  in  casuistry,  not  the  Mes- 
sage of  the  Spirit.  The  directing  functions  of  the 
Roman  Confessional  are  carried  over  to  the  Protes- 
tant pulpit,  and  the  preacher  stands  among  the 
people  as  a  "Ductor  dubitantium"  in  the  most 
literal  sense.  I  do  not,  of  course,  suggest  that 
the  full  extravagance  of  all  this  is  perceived  by 
the  clergy  whose  conduct  yet  presupposes  nothing 
less.  We  may  assume  that  they  are  carried  un- 
consciously by  a  mistaken  method  into  a  situa- 


176      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

tion,  the  absurdity  of  which  is  undetected.  The 
analogy  of  the  Roman  Confessional  is  close  and 
suggestive.  There  also  the  grotesque  result  has 
been  attained  by  the  action  of  a  false  method. 
LiGUORi  has  described  the  qualifications  of  a  con- 
fessor in  terms  so  exalted  that  one  might  weU 
doubt  whether  an  adequately  equipped  confessor 
had  ever  existed  in  the  Church,  which  commis- 
sions every  priest  to  hear  confessions.  He  tells 
us  that  "the  task  of  the  confessor  demands  a 
knowledge  of  all  sciences,  of  all  offices,  and  arts," 
and  a  httle  reflection  will  show  that  he  does  not 
speak  excessively.  Yet  who  is  thus  omniscient 
of  the  sons  of  men?  The  falseness  of  the  theory 
is  proved  by  the  impossible  character  of  its  pre- 
suppositions. So  with  the  case  of  the  Christian 
preacher.  He  cannot  be  reasonably  credited 
with  functions,  for  which  manifestly  he  cannot 
be  adequately  equipped.  Even  if  it  were  other- 
wise, such  precise  direction  from  infallible  guides 
would  run  counter  to  the  true  spirit  of  Christ's 
religion,  and  bring  men  again  under  the  yoke 
of  the  legal  letter.  The  Christian  man  as  such 
has  the  assurance  of  a  Divine  Director,  not  speak- 
ing from  without  in  pulpit  or  confessional,  but 
from  within  the  shrine  of  his  own  surrendered 
heart.  His  own  conscience,  illumined  by  the 
Holy  Ghost  and  guided  by  the  Mind  of  Christ, 
must  be  casuist  and  director  for  every  Christian 
man;    and   the  whole  work  of  the  preacher  is 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       177 

always  ancillary  to  the  action  of  the  individual 
conscience. 

We  may  add  a  practical  consideration,  which 
may  commend  the  argument  in  some  quarters 
where  theoretical  considerations  carry  Httle  weight. 
Whatever  moral  impressiveness  may  attach  to 
the  preacher's  action,  when  at  a  crisis  he  gives 
free  course  to  his  personal  convictions  as  to  the 
rightness  or  wrongness  of  specific  pohcies,  will 
depend  on  his  ordinary  aloofness  from  party 
pohtics.  The  preacher  who  is  continually  de- 
livering himself  on  political  issues  in  the  super- 
lative language  of  perfervid  assurance  has  no 
reserve  of  power  to  draw  upon  in  those  rare  but 
decisive  moments  when  a  clear  voice  of  disin- 
terested guidance  is  the  service  which  the  nation 
requires  from  the  Christian  Church. 

We  conclude,  then,  that  while  the  "liberty  of 
prophesying,"  in  respect  of  direct  appHcations 
of  Christian  principles  to  the  questions,  economic, 
social,  pohtical,  which  form  the  staple  of  party 
conflict  in  free  modern  communities,  must  be 
unrestricted  by  external  authority,  it  ought  to  be 
hmited  by  the  preacher  himself  in  deference  to 
many  considerations  of  varying  degrees  of  cogency. 
The  guiding  principle  throughout  must  be  a  clear 
and  just  perception  of  the  preacher's  proper 
business.  Every  course  of  action  which  implies 
a  departure  from  the  line  of  manifest  duty  must 
be  rigorously  criticized,  and  only  allowed  when 


178      THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

its  Tightness  has  been  made  clear  to  the  preacher's 
conscience.  Exceptional  circumstances  may 
demand  in  the  future  as  in  the  past  that  the 
Christian  preacher  should  become  the  leader  of 
pohtical  opinion,  or  the  organizer  of  social  reform; 
but  normally  it  will  not  be  in  those  characters 
that  he  will  fulfil  his  ministry.  He  is  concerned 
primarily  with  men's  characters,  not  with  their 
circumstances;  by  reforming  the  first  he  aspires 
to  make  them  masters  of  the  last.  Any  action 
which  tends  to  obscure  the  ultimate  purpose  of 
his  ministry  is  doubtful,  and  may  be  dangerously 
wrong.  We  may  apply  to  it  the  vigorous  lan- 
guage of  Baxter,  when  he  emphasizes  the  neces- 
sity of  having  a  right  end  of  ministerial  work: 
"Hard  studies,  much  knowledge,  and  excellent 
preaching,  are  but  more  glorious  and  hypocritical 
sinning  if  the  end  be  not  right." 

The  note  of  Christian  preaching  is  spirituality, 
and  the  effect  of  Christian  preaching  is  spiritual 
mindedness.  The  spirituality  of  the  Gospel  does 
not  mean  its  remoteness  from  common  hfe,  but 
its  power  to  transfigure  common  Hfe  into  some- 
thing enduring  and  sublime.  The  spirituahty  of 
preaching  is  not  shown  by  a  manifest  lack  of 
relevance  to  the  interests  and  activities  of  citizen- 
ship, but  by  a  subjection  of  all  these  to  the  empire 
of  the  Spirit  of  Christ.  The  spirituahty  of  the 
preacher  does  not  mean  that  he  moves  through 
life  with  the  helplessness  of  a  recluse  and    the 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       179 

unconsciousness  of  a  child,  but  that  he  lives  "as 
ever  in  the  great  Task-master's  Eye,"  and  sees 
his  duties,  domestic,  civic,  political  not  less  than 
official,  as  so  many  interpretations  of  his  Mas- 
ter's claim.  The  opposite  of  spirituality  is 
secularity,  and  it  is  secularity  which  has  always 
been  and  always  will  be  the  besetting  danger  of 
the  Christian,  and  preeminently  of  the  Christian 
minister.  The  power  of  his  message  and  the 
impression  made  by  his  example  are  inseparably 
linked,  for  "the  world  is  better  able  to  read  the 
nature  of  rehgion  in  a  man's  life  than  in  the 
Bible,"  and  a  fortiori  than  in  sermons.  It  were 
no  extravagant  or  even  grave  inadequate  de- 
scription of  Christian  preaching  to  say  that  it  is 
always  directed  against  secularity,  that  "mind  of 
the  flesh"  which  is  in  perpetual  conflict  with  the 
"mind  of  the  spirit,"  The  Christian  Hfe  is  a 
gradual  and  advancing  conquest  of  secularity.  I 
beheve  it  is  difficult  to  overestimate  the  value  to 
the  Christian  of  spiritual  preaching,  and  the 
gravity  of  the  loss  which  any  secularizing  of  the 
Christian  pulpit  will  inflict  on  the  Church.  What 
spiritual  benefit  can  be  reasonably  thought  to  come 
from  preaching  which  is  confessedly  connected 
with  party  conflicts,  which  counts  as  an  asset  in 
the  estimate  of  party  resources,  which  aims  at 
stimulating  party  zeal,  not  at  correcting  the  bad 
passions  of  partisanship? 
That  the  motives  of  the  clergy  are  high  and 


i8o      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

unselfish  must  in  justice  be  allowed,  but  this  cir- 
cumstance only  adds  gravity  to  their  error  in 
committing  their  ministry  to  connections  which 
are  intrinsically  degrading.  To  make  the  Church 
acceptable  to  the  multitude  is  a  generous  and  even 
a  legitimate  object,  but  it  may  be  given  too  high 
a  place  in  the  thought  of  the  preacher.  There 
is  need  to  avoid  the  risk  of  compromise  too 
ardently  pursued,  "propter  vitam  perdere  causas 
vivendi." 

Let  me  conclude  my  argument  by  calling  to  your 
remembrance  a  famous  example  of  the  evil  con- 
sequences which  may  follow  a  confusion  of  the 
functions  of  the  preacher  and  the  politician.  If 
I  speak  of  so  familiar  a  history  as  that  of  Savona- 
rola, it  is  because  that  history  is  constantly 
pleaded  as  a  precedent  for  the  political  activity 
of  modern  preachers.  It  may  well  be  main- 
tained that  the  action  of  Savonarola,  in  leaving 
his  normal  tasks  and  undertaking  the  political 
direction  of  Florence,  was  fairly  justified  by  the 
extraordinary  circumstances  in  which  his  de- 
cision was  reluctantly  taken.  His  enthusiastic 
biographer,  Villari,  assures  us  that  he  was 
coerced  by  the  desperate  situation  of  the  city, 
which  regarded  him  as  the  one  person  competent 
to  save  the  State: 

"  Even  now,  when  his  human  will  was  bending 
to  the  irresistible  force  of  events,  when  he  saw  the 
people  languishing  in  idleness  and  misery  in  the 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       i8i 

midst  of  the  general  suspense,  and  his  heart  was 
admonishing  him  that  charity  knows  no  law,  he 
still  struggled  against  his  fate."* 

Necessitas  non  habet  legem.  In  similar  cir- 
cumstances who  would  condemn  a  modern 
preacher  for  deserting  his  proper  ministry,  and 
entering  the  arena  of  political  strife  ? 

Apart,  however,  from  the  defence  which  may 
be  made  for  Savonarola's  action,  is  it  the  case 
that  his  invasion  of  the  political  sphere,  however 
excusable,  is  a  precedent  which  Christian  min- 
isters ought  to  be  eager  to  follow  under  the  very 
different  conditions  of  modern  life?  Does  even 
the  example  of  that  heroic  preacher  permit  us  to 
think  that  the  Christian  minister  as  such  is  well 
adapted  for  political  leadership  ?  We  may  recall 
the  late  Bishop  Creighton's  carefully-weighed 
judgment  on  Savonarola's  career: 

"The  preaching  of  Savonarola  had  led  a  large 
number  of  citizens  to  regard  Charles  VIII  as 
the  scourge  of  God  who  should  purify  the  Church; 
and  Florentine  vanity  was  gratified  by  the  thought 
that  she  was  to  serve  as  a  model  to  the  regenerate 
world.  The  influence  of  Savonarola  was  a  strange 
mixture  of  good  and  evil.  It  awakened  a  higher 
sense  of  Christian  zeal  and  of  moral  effort;  but 
it  also  rested  on  a  definite  scheme  of  pohtics, 
according  to  which  Charles  VIII  was  a  heaven- 
sent  deliverer,   and   the   rights   which   Florence 

^v.  "Life  and  Times,"  vol.  I,  p.  259. 


i82      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

recognized  as  inherent  in  her  own  citizens  were 
denied  to  the  citizens  of  Pisa.  As  a  moral  and 
religious  teacher  Savonarola  deserves  all  praise; 
as  a  politician  he  taught  Florence  to  take  up  a 
position  adverse  to  the  interests  of  Italy,  to  trust 
to  France  blindly  in  spite  of  all  disappointments, 
and  to  war  against  Pisa  for  casting  off  the  Floren- 
tine yoke  in  the  same  way  as  Florence  herself 
had  cast  off  the  yoke  of  the  Medici.  We  cannot 
wonder  that  this  attitude  awakened  no  sympathy 
in  Italy,  and  that  the  efforts  of  the  league  were 
directed  to  the  subjugation  of  Florence."  ^ 

In  the  new  "Cambridge  Modern  History" 
there  is  a  luminous  and  fascinating  study  of 
Savonarola  from  the  pen  of  Mr.  Armstrong, 
the  leading  English  authority  for  the  Italian  his- 
tory of  that  period.  He  points  out  that  with 
Savonarola  "  politics  and  ethics  were  so  closely 
dovetailed  that  he  regarded  opposition  to  his 
political  views  as  involving  sin";  and,  he  adds, 
that  "herein  Hes  his  justification  for  his  un- 
measured denunciation  of  his  opponents."  None 
the  less,  as  Mr.  Armstrong  clearly  establishes, 
Savonarola's  poUtical  views  were  mistaken,  and 
the  ultimate  consequences  of  his  political  action 
disastrous : 

"A  not  unnatural  reaction  against  the  new 
Puritanism  showed  itself  wherever  Savonarola 
temporarily  withdrew  or  lost  his  influence.     Then 

^v.  "History  of  the  Papacy,"  vol.  Ill,  p.  217. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       183 

the  gambling  hells,  the  taverns,  the  brothels  drove 
a  roaring  trade ;  and  Savonarola's  death  was  fol- 
lowed by  scenes  of  profanity  such  as  Florence 
had  never  before  witnessed.  It  was  a  necessary 
result  of  the  fusion  of  ethics  and  pohtics  that  the 
reformer  regarded  opposition  to  his  political  views 
as  involving  sin.  Thus  the  dividing  line  in  poli- 
tics produced  cleavage  in  morals  and  religion  and 
vice  versa.  Serious  political  opponents  became 
confused  with  men  of  pleasure,  and,  indeed,  scents 
and  silk  and  sin  were  too  apt  to  be  the  outward 
signs  of  the  party  loyalty  of  the  Arrabbiati. 
Florence,  on  a  small  scale,  prefigured  our  own 
Commonwealth  and  its  results.^ 

I  will  not  apologize  for  dwelhng  so  long  on  this 
famous  illustration  of  the  "  Preacher  in  Politics," 
for  it  serves  to  illustrate  and  emphasize  the  prac- 
tical suggestion  of  this  discussion.  Since  the 
genius  and  character  of  Savonarola  were  unable 
to  avoid  the  failure  implicit  in  an  intrinsically 
false  blending  of  functions,  we  may  not  venture 
to  count  on  immunity  for  ourselves  when  we  in 
our  turn  repeat  his  error. 

^v.  "Cambridge  Modem  History,"  vol.  I,  p.  169. 


VII 

OF   OBSERVING    PROPORTION    IN    RELIGIOUS 
TEACHING 

"The  great  fundamental  evil  of  our  present 
religious  history,"  said  Bishop  Stubbs  in  1886,  "is 
not  difference  of  opinion,  not  even  difference  of 
behef,  but  the  mischief  of  self-will  and  the  dam- 
age of  disproportion."  ^  Most  thoughtful  men 
will  admit  the  justice  of  this  observation.  A  dis- 
cussion of  the  modern  preacher's  "Liberty  of 
Prophesying"  would  be  seriously  defective  if  it 
left  out  of  count  the  importance  of  maintaining 
a  due  proportion  in  religious  teaching,  and  thus 
guarding  both  preachers  and  congregations 
against  the  formidable  risk  of  false  spiritual 
perspective. 

In  former  times  this  was  the  object  with 
which  "systems"  of  doctrine  were  constructed, 
and  included  as  an  indispensable  element  in  the 
minister's  intellectual  equipment.  The  system- 
makers  always  assumed  that  Christianity  is  an 
articulated  and  coherent  body  of  truth,  including 
within  it  all  sound  knowledge,  and  providing  the 

^v.  "Visitation  Charges,"  p.  59. 
184 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       185 

key  to  all  problems.  They  held,  therefore,  that 
no  part  of  revelation  could  be  studied  safely  in 
isolation  from  the  whole,  with  reference  to  which 
it  had  meaning,  and  apart  from  which  it  might 
even  be  unintelligible.  The  older  authorities 
attached  great  importance  to  the  construction 
of  doctrinal  "systems"  in  their  scheme  of  the 
preacher's  duty.  A  few  examples  will  serve  to 
illustrate  the  point.  George  Herbert,  whose 
conception  of  the  pastoral  office  was  too  ascetic 
and  sacerdotal  to  admit  of  an  adequate  recogni- 
tion of  the  preacher's  function,  yet  describes  the 
rural  clergyman  as  providing  himself  with  a 
doctrinal  "system,"  which  he  thinks  may  best 
be  made  "by  way  of  expounding  the  Church 
Catechism,  to  which  all  divinity  may  easily  be 
reduced."  He  assumes,  however,  a  consider- 
able range  of  clerical  reading.  "The  Country 
Parson  hath  read  the  Fathers  also,  and  the  School- 
men, and  the  later  Writers,  or  a  good  proportion 
of  all,  out  of  all  which  he  hath  compiled  a  book 
and  body  of  Divinity,  which  is  the  storehouse  of 
his  Sermons  and  which  he  preacheth  all  his 
Life,  but  diversely  clothed,  illustrated,  and 
enlarged."  ^ 

Baxter,  unlike  Herbert,  for  whom,  however, 
he  professes  a  deep  respect,  had  been  brought  up 
in  a  Puritan  home,  where  preaching  was  held 

^v.  "Life  and  Works  of  G.  Herbert,"  ed.  Palmer,  vol  I, 
219. 


i86       THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

in  the  greatest  honour.  He  was,  therefore,  little 
likely  to  underrate  the  importance  of  maintaining 
a  just  balance  in  the  preacher's  scheme  of  teach- 
ing, and  in  point  of  fact  his  "Reformed  Pastor" 
sets  the  whole  subject  on  the  highest  level.  In 
an  admirable  and  characteristic  passage  he  dilates 
on  the  duty  of  choosing  subjects  of  preaching 
with  a  due  sense  of  rehgious  importance. 

"Through  the  whole  course  of  our  Ministry, 
we  must  insist  most  upon  the  greatest,  most 
certain  and  necessary  things,  and  be  more  sel- 
dom and  sparing  upon  the  rest.  If  we  can  but 
teach  Christ  to  our  people,  we  teach  them  all. 
Get  them  well  to  heaven,  and  they  will  have 
knowledge  enough.  The  great  and  commonly 
acknowledged  Truths  are  they  that  men  must 
live  upon,  and  which  are  the  great  instruments 
of  raising  the  heart  to  God,  and  destroying  men's 
sins;  and  therefore  we  must  still  have  our  people's 
necessities  in  our  eyes.  It  will  take  us  off  gawds, 
and  needless  ornaments,  and  unprofitable  con- 
troversies, to  remember  that  one  thing  is  neces- 
sary. Other  things  are  desirable  to  be  known, 
but  these  must  be  known,  or  else  our  people  are 
undone  for  ever.  I  confess,  I  think  necessity 
should  be  a  great  disposer  of  a  minister's  course  of 
study  and  labour.  If  we  were  sufficient  for 
everything,  we  might  fall  upon  everything,  and 
take  in  order  the  whole  encyclopaedia:  but  life 
is  short,  and  we  are  dull;  eternal  things  are  neces- 


THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       187 

sary,  and  the  souls  that  depend  on  our  teaching 
are  precious.  I  confess  necessity  hath  been  the 
conductor  of  my  studies  and  hfe;  it  chooseth 
what  book  I  shall  read,  and  tells  when  and  how 
long:  it  chooseth  my  text,  and  makes  my  sermon 
for  matter  and  manner,  so  far  as  I  can  keep  out 
my  own  corruption.  Though  I  know  the  con- 
stant expectation  of  death  hath  been  a  great 
cause  of  this,  yet  I  know  no  reason  why  the  most 
healthful  man  should  not  make  sure  of  the  neces- 
saries first,  considering  the  uncertainty  and 
shortness  of  all  men's  lives."  ^ 

The  subjects  of  controversy  have  changed 
wonderfully  since  the  year  1655,  when  these 
words  were  written,  and  the  sombre  note  of 
urgency  which  pervades  them  is  rarely  heard 
now,  yet  I  apprehend  that  substantially  the  situ- 
ation remains  the  same,  and  the  modern  preacher 
will  have  no  real  difficulty  in  recognizing  the 
relevancy  of  the  great  Puritan's  warning  to  his 
own  case. 

In  his  autobiography  Baxter  records  a  remark- 
able change  of  mind,  which  illustrates  his  theory. 
The  passage  is  well  known,  but  will  bear  repe- 
tition : 

"In  my  youth,"  he  writes,   "I  was  quickly 
past  my  fundamentals,  and  was  running  up  into 
a   multitude    of   controversies,    and    greatly   de- 
lighted with  metaphysical  and  scholastic  writings 
^v.  "Works,"  ed.  Orme,  vol.  XIV,  p.  121. 


i88       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

(though  I  must  needs  say  my  preaching  was 
still  on  the  necessary  points) :  but  the  elder  I 
grew  the  smaller  stress  I  laid  upon  these  contro- 
versies and  curiosities  (though  still  my  intellect 
abhorreth  confusion),  as  finding  far  greater 
uncertainties  in  them  than  I  at  first  discerned, 
and  finding  less  usefulness  comparatively,  even 
where  there  is  the  greatest  certainty.  And  now 
it  is  the  fundamental  doctrines  of  the  catechism, 
which  I  highliest  value,  and  daily  think  of,  and 
find  most  useful  to  myself  and  others:  the  Creed, 
the  Lord's  Prayer,  and  the  Ten  Commandments, 
do  find  me  now  the  most  acceptable  and  plentiful 
matter  for  all  my  meditations;  they  are  to  me  as 
my  daily  bread  and  drink;  and  as  I  can  speak 
and  write  of  them  over  and  over  again,  so  I  had 
rather  read  or  hear  of  them  than  of  any  of  the 
school  niceties,  which  once  so  much  pleased  me. 
And  thus  I  observed  it  was  with  old  Bishop 
Usher,  and  with  many  other  men."^ 

Baxter's  heart  was  ever  in  conflict  with  his 
head,  the  pastoral  tenderness  of  the  one  contend- 
ing with  the  logical  severity  and  speculative 
ardour  of  the  other,  so  that  his  contemporaries 
found  him  the  most  controversial  and  the  least 
intolerant  of  religious  leaders.  Yet  of  all  the 
numerous  and  excellent  books  on  the  work  of 
the  Christian  minister,  there  is  none  in  my 
judgment   better   worth    the   modern   preacher's 

^v.  "Autobiography,"  Book  I,  p.  126. 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       189 

Study  than  his  "Reformed  Pastor."  To  this 
may  be  added  his  "Autobiography,"  which  is  not 
only  a  mine  of  historical  information,  but  the 
record  of  the  most  arduous  and  least  selfish 
ministry  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Bishop  Burnet  in  his  well-known  discourse 
"Of  the  Pastoral  Care"  defends  the  use  of 
"systems  of  divinity,"  which  had  been  not  a 
little  discredited  by  the  metaphysical  refinements 
of  their  authors,  and  the  barren  controversies 
which  they  seemed  to  foster. 

"Here  is  a  vast  error  in  the  first  forming  of 
our  clergy,  that  a  contempt  has  been  cast  on 
that  sort  of  books;  and  indeed  to  rise  no  higher 
than  to  a  perpetual  reading  over  different  systems 
is  but  a  mean  pitch  of  learning ;  and  the  swallow- 
ing down  whole  systems  by  the  lump  has  helped 
to  possess  people's  minds  too  early  with  preju- 
dices, and  to  shut  them  up  in  too  implicit  a  fol- 
lowing of  others.  But  the  throwing  off  all 
these  books  makes  that  many  who  have  read  a 
great  deal  yet  have  no  entire  body  of  divinity  in 
their  head;  they  have  no  scheme  or  method,  and 
so  are  ignorant  of  some  very  plain  things,  which 
could  never  have  happened  to  them  if  they  had 
carefully  read  and  digested  a  system  into  their 
memories." 

Burnet  was  an  advocate  of  extemporaneous 
preaching,  and  as  such  reaUzed  the  risks  of  igno- 
rance, when  the  preacher's  fervour  or  natural 


I  go      THE    LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

eloquence  were  unchecked  by  a  manuscript. 
"  He  must  be  ready  with  the  whole  body  of  divin- 
ity in  his  head,"  said  the  bishop  rather  help- 
lessly. Bishop  Gibson  in  the  "Directions  to 
his  Clergy,"  issued  in  1724,  speaks  with  much 
earnestness  against  the  anti-doctrinal  tendency 
which  at  that  time  had  made  its  appearance  in 
England,  and  which  was  destined  to  transform 
the  whole  aspect  of  the  national  religion.  "It 
is  always  to  be  remembered,"  he  said,  "that  we 
are  Christian  preachers  and  not  barely  preachers 
of  morality."  He  rightly  interpreted  this  anti- 
doctrinal  tendency  as  the  result  of  a  reaction 
against  the  excessive  dogmatism  of  the  Puritan 
preachers,  which  set  in  at  the  Restoration  and 
led  the  AngHcan  clergy  to  treat  in  the  pulpit 
rather  of  "the  heads  of  morality"  than  of  "the 
heads  of  divinity."  The  bishop  would  have  the 
clergy  "avoid  both  extremes,"  and  do  justice  to 
both.  To  this  end  he  advised  "the  setting  apart 
some  certain  seasons  of  the  year  for  catechetical 
discourses  whether  in  the  way  of  expounding  or 
preaching."  These,  he  said,  "being  carried 
on  regularly,  though  at  different  times,  accord- 
ing to  the  order  and  method  of  the  church  cate- 
chism, will  lead  the  minister,  as  by  a  thread,  to 
the  great  and  fundamental  doctrines  of  the 
Christian  faith;  and  not  only  to  explain  them  to 
the  people,  but  to  lay  out  the  particular  duties 
which  more  immediately  flow  from  each  head, 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       191 

together  with  the  encouragements  to  the  per- 
formance of  them;  so  that  principle  and  practice 
may  go  hand  in  hand,  as  they  do  throughout  the 
whole  Christian  scheme,  and  as  they  certainly 
ought  to  do  throughout  the  preaching  of  every 
Christian  minister." 

Rather  more  than  a  century  later,  another 
English  divine,  Kaye,  bishop  of  Lincoln,  spoke 
in  similar  terms  to  the  clergy  of  his  diocese,  and 
I  suppose  it  would  not  be  difficult  to  construct 
a  catena  of  authorities  from  the  Reformation  to 
the  present  time  in  support  of  the  same  view  as 
he  clearly  set  forth  in  these  words: 

"It  is  essential  to  the  efficacy  of  our  preaching 
that  we  should  ourselves  possess  a  clear  and 
connected  and  comprehensive  view  of  the  scheme 
of  the  gospel  dispensation,  and  be  able  to  exhibit 
its  different  parts  in  their  due  proportions  and  in 
their  mutual  dependence  upon  each  other.  We 
should  regard  them  as  forming  a  chain,  of  which 
the  very  existence  depends  on  the  union  of  its 
various  links.  The  justice  of  this  remark  is  so 
universally  recognized  that,  as  the  doctrines  of 
the  gospel  are  not  systematically  proposed  in 
Scripture,  every  branch  of  the  visible  Church  of 
Christ  has  drawn  up  a  system  for  the  instruc- 
tion and  guidance  of  its  ministers."  The  bishop 
proceeds  to  claim  for  the  Thirty-nine  Articles 
the  character  of  a  system  authoritatively  pro- 
vided for  the  Anglican  clergy,  but  we  may  sep- 


192       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

arate  his  general  position  from  his  particular 
illustration. 

The  Protestant  "systems  of  divinity"  replaced 
in  the  Reformed  Churches  the  traditional  system 
of  the  Mediaeval  Church,  which,  at  the  time  of 
the  Reformation,  had  become  plainly  inadequate 
to  Christian  needs.  At  the  Council  of  Trent 
the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  restored  to  vigour 
and  mihtancy  by  the  Jesuits,  formulated  the 
mediaeval  tradition  into  a  coherent  and  compre- 
hensive doctrinal  scheme,  as  superior  to  its  rivals 
in  logical  completeness  and  formal  authority 
as  it  was  inferior  in  spiritual  quality  and  intellect- 
ual range.  Of  all  alike,  however,  it  must  be 
said  that  they  can  no  longer  serve  their  original 
purpose.  The  modern  preacher  is  more  embar- 
rassed than  assisted  by  the  authoritative  sys- 
tems of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries. 
Nevertheless  the  practical  reasons  which  then 
demanded  their  provision  retain  their  force; 
and  perhaps  no  circumstance  of  the  present  situ- 
ation is  more  disquieting  than  the  absence  in 
the  case  of  many  preachers  of  any  adequate 
consciousness  of  the  obligation,  which  certainly 
rests  on  them,  to  guard  the  integrity  of  the  Chris- 
tian revelation,  and  the  necessity  of  regarding 
truth  in  its  totahty  if  isolated  aspects  of  truth 
are  not  to  be  wrongly  presented. 

The  risks  of  doctrinal  lopsidedness  indeed 
were  perhaps  never  so  great  as  at  the  present 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       193 

time.  From  many  sides  the  balance  of  truth  is 
threatened.  Take  but  the  three  disturbing  fac- 
tors which  every  preacher  must  reckon  with  — 
his  own  idiosyncrasy  and  personal  preferences, 
the  drifts  of  contemporary  opinion,  the  pressure 
of  his  congregation.  The  first  is  a  form  of  profes- 
sional selfishness,  the  next  a  source  of  distraction, 
the  last  a  subtle  temptation  to  unfaithfulness. 
Natural  temperament  is  the  subtlest  and  the 
strongest  of  all  the  forces  which  shape  men's 
action,  and  of  all  the  influences  which  disturb 
the  preacher's  doctrinal  perspective  perhaps  the 
most  innocent  and  the  most  injurious  is  the  stu- 
dent's partiahty  for  his  own  subject,  or  the 
Christian's  preoccupation  with  his  own  spiritual 
problems.  Christian  experience  seems  to  indi- 
cate that  the  risk  of  disturbance  varies  inversely 
with  the  intrinsic  importance  of  the  subject,  and 
that  the  preoccupation  is  the  greater  as  the  prob- 
lems are  more  purely  personal.  Prophetic  or 
apocalyptic  interpretation  is  a  case  which  will 
immediately  occur  to  the  mind.  What  can  be 
more  spiritually  unimportant  than  the  specula- 
tions, which  have  filled  a  vast  multitude  of  the 
books,  which  once  stirred  in  myriads  of  readers 
an  almost  frenzied  interest,  but  which  now  lie 
unopened  save  by  the  curious  from  year's  end 
to  year's  end  on  the  shelves  of  our  libraries?  yet 
what  have  ever  been  so  strangely  absorbing 
to  the  speculating  authors   themselves?    What, 


194       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

again,  can  be  more  strictly  personal  than  the 
actual  circumstances  in  which  a  preacher  was 
"converted,"  the  specific  errors  which  blinded 
him,  or  the  specific  sins  which  held  him  in  bond- 
age; yet  what  is  more  frequent  than  the  egotistic 
note  in  preaching,  the  constant  reference,  appar- 
ent even  when  not  avowed,  to  the  preacher's  own 
religious  habit,  and  his  own  intellectual  and 
moral  temptations.  Some  Protestant  churches 
include  in  their  constitution  what  are  called 
"experience  meetings,"  that  is,  meetings  in  which 
individual  believers  confess  publicly  their  per- 
sonal experiences  for  the  comfort  and  encourage- 
ment of  others.  I  am  far  from  presuming  to 
decide  whether  this  arrangement  has  been  found 
religiously  advantageous  or  not,  but  I  am  sure 
that  nothing  but  mischief  can  come  from  any 
confusion  between  the  pulpit  and  the  experience 
meeting.  The  functions  of  the  two  are  quite 
distinct.  Attention  has  already  been  directed 
to  the  singular  persistence  of  class  prejudices  in 
the  ranks  of  the  Christian  ministry,  to  the  strange 
facility  with  which  prevailing  currents  of  pop- 
ular opinion  find  expression  in  the  pulpit,  to  the 
unwholesome  pressures  of  the  congregations. 
All  these  are  hostile  to  that  just  sense  of  propor- 
tion, which  the  preacher  must  maintain  if  he  is 
to  be  faithful  to  his  vocation  as  the  "steward  of 
the  mysteries  of  God."  It  would  be  difficult  to 
overstate  the  gravity  of  doctrinal  lopsidedness. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       195 

Whether  we  consider  its  effect  on  the  preacher 
himself,  or  on  his  message,  or  on  his  congre- 
gation, we  cannot  avoid  this  conclusion.  The 
preacher  becomes  fanatical.  Ever  harping  on 
one  theme,  and  fixing  his  attention  on  one  aspect 
of  his  duty,  he  loses  the  sense  of  proportion  as 
the  result  of  abandoning  the  habit.  The  mes- 
sage becomes  a  heresy.  Accumulations  of  false 
emphasis  finally  effect  a  complete  perversion. 
The  congregation  becomes  in  spirit,  if  not  in 
name,  schismatical.  Trained  to  accept  a  purely 
individualistic  version  of  religion,  it  loses  touch 
with  the  common  heritage  of  faith,  and  is  de- 
prived of  its  normal  safeguards  against  error. 
Fanaticism  is  but  zeal  unbalanced:  heresy  is 
but  truth  in  wrong  perspective;  the  crowning  sin 
of  schism  is  but  individualism  unchecked. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  that  the  preservation 
of  truth  in  its  integrity,  and  the  setting  forth  of 
its  several  parts  in  due  perspective,  are  perhaps 
the  principal  reasons  why  preaching  has  been 
generally  confined  to  the  ordained  ministry. 
The  preacher  is  supposed  to  be  exempt  from 
the  distorting  influences,  to  which  men  are  ordi- 
narily exposed.  He  has  special  knowledge  of 
religion,  and  by  that  circumstance  is  set  free 
from  all  the  countless  errors,  of  which  the  origin 
lies  in  sheer  ignorance.  He  again  is  able  to 
order  his  life  on  religious  principles.  He  is  set 
free  from  those  distractions  of  the  secular  life 


196      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

which  indispose  men  to  think  clearly,  or  feel 
deeply,  about  spiritual  concerns.  His  profes- 
sion itself  is  religious;  the  conflict  between  their 
religion  and  their  business,  which  so  frequently 
distresses  other  men,  and  in  many  cases  seems 
incapable  of  being  composed,  is  for  him  unknown. 
Of  course  it  is  true  that  these  advantages  are 
purchased  at  a  heavy  price,  "Be  not  many 
teachers,"  said  S.  James,  "knowing  that  we 
shall  receive  heavier  judgment."  The  clergy- 
man escapes  many  temptations  of  the  layman, 
but  he  has  other  temptations  of  his  own,  more 
subtle  and  perhaps  more  dangerous.  He  must 
face  the  difficulties  which  the  layman  need  not 
know;  he  must  enter  into  perplexities  not  his 
own,  and  do  battle  with  the  doubts  of  others. 
His  very  advantages  may  become  so  many  snares 
to  him.  "A  man's  foes  shall  be  they  of  his  own 
household,"  said  the  Lord.  If  the  record  of 
the  Christian  ministry  be  strangely  scandalous, 
stained  on  every  page  with  the  ambition,  arro- 
gance, idleness,  and  sensuality  of  clergymen, 
the  reason  lies  not  in  their  exceptional  badness, 
but  in  the  extraordinary  moral  strain  implied 
in  their  work.  "Corruptio  optimi  pessima." 
The  better  the  individual,  the  more  conscious  is 
he  of  the  discrepancy  between  his  office  and 
himself;  and  the  burden  of  that  continuing  dis- 
cord is  hard  to  bear.  The  greatest  of  all  Chris- 
tian ministers  described  himself  as  filled  with 


THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING      197 

anxiety  lest,  after  having  preached  to  others,  he 
himself  should  be  rejected;  and  lesser  men  may 
not  hope  to  escape  the  fears  which  shadowed 
the  heroic  spirit  of  S.  Paul,  The  greater  the 
preacher's  gifts,  the  greater  his  dangers.  Pro- 
found despondency  follows  the  exaltations  of 
the  pulpit;  the  "orator's  temperament"  has 
special  risks  of  its  own;  and  success  draws  ever 
behind  it  the  vulgar  temptations  to  ambition 
and  avarice.  Still,  when  all  is  said,  it  remains  the 
case  that  the  Christian  minister  is  fairly  assumed 
to  be  exempt  from  the  normal  conditions  of 
spiritual  failure.  He  has  the  opportunities  of 
knowing  the  truth:  he  may  order  his  life  after 
his  convictions:  he  may  make  rehgion  the  prin- 
cipal, nay,  the  sole,  concern.  These  are  no 
mean  advantages:  and  they  may  fairly  be  sup- 
posed to  guarantee  in  the  clergyman  that  large 
and  balanced  view  of  Christianity  which  sets 
aU  things  in  their  true  perspective. 

The  modern  preacher  is,  however,  in  some  im- 
portant respects  at  a  disadvantage,  when  com- 
pared with  his  predecessors.  It  will  suffice  to 
specify  five  circumstances  which  are  distinctive 
of  the  present  situation,  and  all  more  or  less 
unprecedented  —  change  of  social  custom  in  the 
matter  of  rehgious  observance,  fluidity  of  modern 
populations  implying  the  failure  of  the  old  local 
conditions,  brevity  of  modern  sermons,  free 
discussion  of  sacred  subjects  in  the  secular  press, 


198      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

the  baleful  influence  of  the  so-called  religious 
newspapers,  themselves  the  creatures  and  instru- 
ments of  rehgious  partisanship.  A  brief  con- 
sideration of  these  circumstances  will  not  be 
irrelevant  to  our  present  discussion,  or  in  itself 
uninteresting. 

I.  Change  of  social  habit.  It  can  hardly  be 
questioned  that  the  tendency  of  social  habit  is 
for  the  present  markedly  unfavourable  to  all 
forms  of  religious  profession.  Whatever  may 
have  been  the  case  at  a  still  earlier  period,  it 
certainly  is  true  that,  from  the  third  decade  of 
the  last  century,  religious  profession  was  the 
established  convention  of  English  society.  But 
within  the  last  generation  a  remarkable  change 
has  passed  over  the  nation.  In  an  English 
country  house,  for  example,  it  is  no  longer  ex- 
pected of  the  guests  that  they  should  attend  the 
service  of  the  parish  church.  The  old  habit  of 
saying  grace  before  meals  is  quickly  falling  into 
disuse.  Family  prayers  are  becoming  excep- 
tional. To  play  golf  during  the  hours  of  divine 
service  is  no  longer  an  unusual  thing  even  in  the 
case  of  men  who  would  profess  to  be  members 
of  the  Christian  Church.  Probably  the  lowest 
orders  have  never  been  accustomed  to  make 
any  religious  profession,  but  the  upper  artisan 
and  lower  middle  classes  are  now  beginning  to 
emulate  the  laxity  of  the  classes  above  them.  It 
is  not  necessary  to  suppose  that  the  change  of 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       199 

social  habit  has  coincided  with  any  considerable 
change  of  religious  belief.  When  church-going 
was  part  of  the  custom  of  cultured  English  life, 
it  might  mean  little  more.  Mr.  Gladstone  once 
said  to  me  in  conversation  that  he  thought  Chris- 
tianity was  a  greater  force  in  English  politics  in 
his  old  age  than  he  remembered  it  to  have  been 
in  his  youth,  though  the  expression  of  it  was 
less.  Still,  from  the  preacher's  point  of  view,  it 
is  a  very  serious  thing  that  attendance  at  divine 
service,  implying,  of  course,  audience  of  sermons, 
should  be  declining.  Dean  Stanley  conjec- 
tured that  "complete  individual  isolation  from 
all  ecclesiastical  organizations  whatever  might 
be  the  ultimate  goal  to  which  the  world  is  tend- 
ing." It  is  evident  that  every  approximation 
to  such  a  state  must  imply  a  diminution  of  the 
preacher's  opportunities,  and  a  restriction  of 
his  influence. 

II.  Fluidity  of  modern  populations  implying 
failure  of  the  old  local  conditions.  Until  com- 
paratively recent  times  the  bulk  of  the  English 
people  was  stationary,  being  mainly  engaged  in 
agriculture.  The  means  of  communication  were 
few  and  bad.  Roads  were  ill  made;  and  rivers 
ill  managed.  Canals  were  not  many,  and  of 
steamships  and  railways  there  were  none.  Per- 
force the  people  remained  in  their  ancestral 
villages,  and  the  system  of  government  in  Church 
and  State  assumed  that  they  would.     Even  Indus- 


aoo      THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

trialism  in  its  earlier  stages  implied  a  stationary 
population.  For  convenience  and  for  safety  the 
manufacturer  and  the  merchant  lived  within  the 
walls  of  cities,  and  personally  watched  over  their 
workmen.  The  city  parishes  were  densely  pop- 
ulated, and  no  charges  were  accounted  to  be  of 
greater  spiritual  importance  than  those  of  the 
city  clergy.  In  the  course  of  the  last  century 
all  this  has  been  changed,  and  the  change  pro- 
ceeds at  an  accelerating  pace.  Instead  of  a 
stationary  population  there  is  now  a  population 
in  continual  movement.  The  churches  are  in 
many  places  almost  wholly  deserted;  in  many 
more  they  are  attended  by  congregations  drawn 
from  many  sides  and  always  changing:  in  com- 
paratively few,  save  in  the  depths  of  the  country, 
can  the  preacher  count  on  the  regular  attendance 
of  the  same  persons.  The  bearing  of  this  social 
revolution,  for  it  is  nothing  less,  on  the  preacher's 
work  is  as  important  as  it  is  unfavourable.  Es- 
pecially in  this  vital  matter  of  guarding  the  integ- 
rity of  the  faith,  presenting  its  several  aspects 
and  constituent  truths  in  due  perspective,  the 
preacher's  duty  is  rendered  immensely  more 
difficult  by  it.  How  is  it  possible  to  set  out 
Christianity  as  a  whole  in  a  single  sermon? 
What  preaching  can  be  justly  appraised  by  an 
occasional  hearer?  Yet  the  modern  preacher 
must  commonly  make  his  count  with  single 
sermons   and   occasional   hearers.      Still   worse, 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING      201 

however,  is  the  destruction  of  the  old  pastoral  rela- 
tionship, on  which  depended  ail  those  private  and 
ancillary  ministries  which  secured  for  the  public 
preaching  an  audience  both  respectful  and  intel- 
ligent. The  great  place  in  their  schemes  of 
pastoral  duty  assigned  by  the  older  authorities 
to  personal  dealing  with  individuals  is  justified 
by  the  weightiest  considerations,  but  the  mod- 
ern preacher,  fulfilling  his  ministry  in  a  shifting 
population,  cannot,  with  the  best  will  in  the  world, 
carry  into  practice  the  admirable  directions  of 
the  masters.  Baxter's  experience  of  the  futil- 
ity of  public  preaching  standing  by  itself  is  cer- 
tainly not  exceptional: 

"I  know  that  the  public  preaching  is  the  most 
excellent  means,  because  we  speak  to  many  at 
once;  but  otherwise,  it  is  usually  far  more  effect- 
ual to  preach  it  privately  to  a  particular  sinner; 
for  the  plainest  man  that  is  can  scarcely  speak 
plain  enough  in  public  for  them  to  understand; 
but  in  private  we  may  much  more.  In  public 
we  may  not  use  such  homely  expressions,  or 
repetitions,  as  their  dulness  doth  require,  but  in 
private  we  may.  In  public  our  speeches  are 
long,  and  we  quite  overrun  their  understandings 
and  memories,  and  they  are  confounded  and  at 
a  loss,  and  not  able  to  follow  us,  and  one  thing 
drives  out  another,  so  that  they  know  not  what 
we  said;  but  in  private  we  can  take  our  work 
'gradatim,'   and  take  our  hearers  with  us  as  we 


202      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

go;  and  by  questions  and  their  answers  can  see 
how  far  they  go  with  us,  and  what  we  have  next 
to  do.  In  public,  by  length  and  speaking  alone, 
we  lose  their  attention;  but  when  they  are  inter- 
locutors we  can  easily  cause  them  to  attend. 
Besides  that,  we  can,  as  we  above  said,  better 
answer  the  objections  and  engage  them  by  prom- 
ises before  we  leave  them,  which  in  public  we 
cannot  do.  I  conclude,  therefore,  that  public 
preaching  will  not  be  sufficient:  for  though  it 
may  be  an  effectual  means  to  convert  many,  yet 
not  so  many  as  experience  and  God's  appoint- 
ment of  further  means  may  assure  us.  You 
may  long  study  and  preach  to  Httle  purpose,  if 
you  neglect  this  duty."  ^ 

It  is  not  only  the  personal  action  of  the  clergy- 
man which  is  affected  by  the  new  fluidity  of 
modern  life.  The  disciplines  of  home  and  neigh- 
bourhood are  breaking  down.  The  preacher 
may  no  longer  assume  that  there  is  religious 
teaching  in  the  one,  or  moral  oversight  in  the 
other.  "  Get  masters  of  famiHes  to  their  duties," 
wrote  Baxter,  "and  they  will  spare  you  great 
deal  of  labour  with  the  rest,  and  further  much 
the  success  of  your  labours."  This  invaluable 
auxiliary  is  hardly  any  more  to  be  counted  on. 
Parents  rarely  attempt  any  systematic  instruc- 
tion of  their  children,  and  the  old  recognized 
cooperation  with  the  clergy  in  the  sacred  task 

^v.  "Works,"  ed.  Orme,  vol.  XIV,  p.  276. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       203 

is  almost  perished.  The  suggestion  of  any 
quasi-parental  responsibihty  for  religious  train- 
ing as  belonging  to  employers  of  the  young  — 
which  is  the  just  assumption  of  the  older  author- 
ities —  provokes  now  only  a  pitying  smile.  One 
advantage,  indeed,  the  modern  preacher  has 
possessed  which  his  predecessors  had  not.  He 
has  the  elementary  school,  which,  on  the  lowest 
estimate  of  its  functions,  performs  for  him  the 
pioneer  work  of  wakening  the  intelligence  into 
life,  and  arming  it  with  the  indispensable  ele- 
ments of  knowledge.  This  is  no  mean  service, 
but  it  is  not  unattended  with  disadvantages, 
when,  as  is  too  often  the  case,  the  school  and 
the  Church  are,  so  to  speak,  at  cross-purposes. 
Throughout  the  civilized  world  the  question 
whether  or  not  religious  teaching  should  retain  a 
place  in  the  scheme  of  public  education  is  in 
debate.  In  England  the  elementary  schools 
have  hitherto  been  mainly  under  the  control  of 
the  Established  Church,  and  the  parish  clergy 
have  been  able  to  assume  that  their  parishioners 
have  been  grounded  in  the  elements  of  Christian 
faith  and  morals.  This  comfortable  assump- 
tion can  no  longer  be  made  over  great  part  of 
the  country,  and  it  is  probable  will  soon  be 
legitimate  nowhere.  The  probability  is  that 
within  a  few  years  the  intractable  jealousies  of 
the  churches  will  force  on  the  English  nation  the 
justly  abhorred  policy  of  purely  secular  schools. 


204      THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

That  will  be  a  great  disaster  in  many  respects, 
and  the  Christian  preacher  will  be  placed  at  a 
fresh  and  most  serious  disadvantage.  Bishop 
Gibson's  warning  will  surely  be  verified: 

"If  children  be  not  early  instructed  in  the  gen- 
eral principles  of  their  rehgion,  but  remain  stran- 
gers to  the  sense  and  meaning  of  the  terms  under 
which  they  are  couched,  the  public  discourses 
they  afterwards  hear  will  neither  be  understood 
nor  relished  by  them;  at  least,  will  lose  much 
of  the  instruction  they  would  have  conveyed  and 
the  impression  they  would  have  made,  if  the 
hearers  had  been  duly  prepared,  first,  by  a  gen- 
eral knowledge  of  the  principles  of  their  religion, 
and  next  by  an  habitual  reverence  for  the  public 
devotions  and  instructions  of  the  church;  as 
ordinances  of  God's  own  appointment,  and  as 
a  special  means  of  obtaining  his  grace  and  fa- 
vour, to  all  those  who  religiously  attend  them."  * 

III.  Brevity  of  modern  sermons.  While  thus 
the  modern  preacher  is  driven  back  on  the  ser- 
mon as  almost  his  sole  instrument  of  teaching, 
he  has  to  use  that  instrument  in  circumstances 
of  unparalleled  difficulty.  The  time  at  his  dis- 
posal is  brief  beyond  all  Christian  precedent. 
It  is,  of  course,  inconceivable  that  modern  con- 
gregations would  ever  tolerate  again  the  im- 
mense discourses  which  were  so  popular  in  the 
seventeenth  century.     There  is  not  the  slightest 

*v.  "Charge,"  1741,  1742. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       205 

reason  for  thinking  that  the  hour-glasses  which 
still  linger  in  some  of  our  older  pulpits  will  ever 
again  be  restored  to  use.  Archbishop  Leigh- 
ton's  courageous  innovation  on  the  estabhshed 
practice  of  his  age  has  been  approved  by  poster- 
ity. In  his  Charge  to  the  clergy  of  Dunblane  in 
the  year  1666,  he  attacked  the  reigning  conven- 
tions with  much  vigour,  and  amongst  them  the 
inordinate  length  of  sermons.  "If,"  he  said, 
"the  minister  think  fit  to  make  his  sermon  for 
the  time  upon  some  part  of  what,  by  himself  or 
by  his  appointment,  hath  been  read,  it  may  do 
well;  and  possibly  so  much  the  better,  the  longer 
the  text  be  and  the  shorter  the  sermon  be;  for 
it  is  greatly  to  be  suspected  that  our  usual  way  of 
very  short  texts  and  very  long  sermons  is  apt  to 
weary  people  more  and  profit  them  less." 

Bishop  Burnet,  who  was  Leighton's  de- 
voted disciple,  urged  the  same  view.  "The 
shorter  sermons  are,  they  are  generally  both 
better  heard  and  better  remembered.  The  cus- 
tom of  an  hour's  length  forces  many  preachers 
to  trifle  away  much  of  the  time,  and  to  spin  out 
their  matter,  so  as  to  hold  out.  So  great  a  length 
does  also  flat  the  hearers  and  tempt  them  to 
sleep;  especially  when,  as  is  usual,  the  first  part 
of  the  sermon  is  languid  and  heavy.  In  half  an 
hour  a  man  may  lay  open  his  matter  in  its  full 
extent,  and  cut  oflF  those  superfluities  which  come 
in  only  to  lengthen  the  discourse;   and  he  may 


2o6      THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

hope  to  keep  up  the  attention  of  his  people  all 
the  while."  It  is  on  record  that  Burnet  did 
not  commend  his  theory  by  his  practice,  being 
himself  a  very  lengthy  preacher.  Conciseness 
and  lucidity  are  indeed  indispensable  attributes  of 
the  modern  sermon,  but  let  the  preacher  be  as 
concise  as  Hort  and  as  lucid  as  Dean  Swift, 
he  cannot  preach  effectively  without  sufficient 
time  to  develop  his  argument  and  enforce  his 
moral.  There  is  a  real  danger  that  sufficient 
time  will  not  be  allowed  him.  His  own  indolence 
may  silently  cooperate  with  the  public  taste  for 
short  and  ever  shorter  sermons;  and  the  noblest 
aspect  of  his  sacred  office  may,  as  it  were  by 
sheer  inadvertence,  be  suffered  to  fall  into  irre- 
mediable discredit.  It  is  certainly  as  true  of 
preaching  as  of  any  other  form  of  human  effort 
that  the  lowering  of  ideals  implies  loss  of  efffciency, 
and  it  is  obvious  that  the  ideal  of  most  modern 
preachers  when  they  prepare  for  the  weekly 
"sermonette"  of  fifteen  or  twenty  minutes,  which 
is  all  that  many  congregations  desire,  and  as 
much  as  some  will  tolerate,  is  almost  infinitely 
lower  than  that  of  those  older  preachers,  whose 
weekly  sermons  represented  a  degree  of  labour 
and  often  of  erudition  which  move  the  wonder 
of  their  degenerate  successors  and  seem  to  rebuke 
their  frivolity.  While  thus  the  preacher  himself 
is  induced  to  belittle  his  most  exalted  function 
by  the  circumstance  that  his  congregation  takes 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       207 

a  mean  view  of  it,  the  congregation  itself  is  alter- 
ing for  the  worse.  Only  a  preacher  can  estimate 
(and  he  rarely  suspects)  the  effect  of  the  congre- 
gation on  the  man  who  habitually  addresses  it 
from  the  pulpit.  There  is  a  further  considera- 
tion which  certainly  must  be  reckoned  with,  at 
least  in  Anglican  churches.  The  development 
of  "  musical  services"  has  brought  to  the  churches 
many  whose  interest  in  religion  is  far  more 
aesthetic  than  religious,  to  whom  the  music  is 
more  than  the  worship,  and  the  organist  a  more 
important  person  than  the  preacher.  Even 
within  the  ranks  of  the  genuinely  religious  there 
is  quickly  formed  a  state  of  opinion  very  unfav- 
ourable to  the  highest  estimate  of  the  preacher's 
task,  and  it  is  scarcely  excessive  to  say  that,  at 
the  present  time,  the  preacher  will  often  be 
encouraged  by  his  congregation  to  take  a  very 
poor  conception  of  his  office.  In  this  connec- 
tion it  may  be  observed  that  the  old  reasons  for 
giving  a  large  place  to  music  in  church  are 
hardly  as  strong  as  formerly,  since  the  spread  of 
musical  education  and  the  rapid  extension  of 
all  forms  of  musical  entertainment.  It  is  no 
longer  necessary  to  go  to  the  churches  for  the 
best  music,  and  therefore  the  place  of  music  in 
the  public  services  can  be  determined  solely 
with  regard  to  religious  considerations  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  word.  Worship  threatens 
to    degenerate  into   sensuous    indulgence  when 


2o8      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

the  leading  motive  of  the  worshipper  is  found  in 
his  keen  enjoyment  of  that  element  in  the  service 
which  has  no  necessary  or  indeed  natural  con- 
nection with  his  conscience  or  with  his  reason. 
Be  this  as  it  may,  it  must  be  apparent  that  the 
preacher  is  in  hard  case  when  he  strives  to  observe 
the  proportions  of  truth  in  discourses  so  straitly 
limited  in  time,  and  Hstened  to  with  so  faint  an 
interest. 

IV.  Free  discussion  of  sacred  subjects  in  the 
secidar  press.  We  are  only  beginning  to  perceive 
the  consequences  of  extending  education  to  the 
multitude.  An  educated  democracy  is  a  new 
thing  in  human  experience,  for  the  slave-based 
republic  of  ancient  Athens  may  be  left  out  of 
count,  and  we  have  not  yet  realized  what  it 
involves  and  requires.  "Religion  has  become 
once  for  all  a  matter  of  personal  taste,"  said 
Renan  lightly,  and  the  fact  is  as  certain  as  it  is 
dismaying;  for  rehgion,  from  which  the  concep- 
tion of  authority  has  perished,  is  religion  only 
in  name.  Modern  democracy  is  bending  all 
things  to  its  will.  It  has  an  immense  curiosity 
and  little  patience.  Its  self-confidence  is  ex- 
treme, but  its  sense  of  obhgation  is  feeble,  and 
its  faculty  of  reverence  undeveloped.  Knowl- 
edge, therefore,  must  be  so  presented  as  to  inflict 
no  labour  on  the  intellect,  and  impose  no  shackles 
on  the  will.  The  truly  fearful  phenomenon  of 
the  popular  press  is  the  creature  of  these  condi- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       209 

tions.  Nothing  is  too  sacred  for  handling: 
nothing  too  obscure  for  summary  in  headlines; 
nothing  too  delicate  for  statement  in  a  para- 
graph. The  mind  of  an  intelUgent  artisan  in 
England  or  America  nourished  on  the  class  news- 
papers must  be  an  anarchy  of  multifarious, 
half-understood,  unrelated  information  on  every 
conceivable  subject.  Religion  and  morahty  enter 
more  or  less  obviously  into  every  form  of  human 
effort,  and  they  are  of  all  subjects  the  most 
unsuitable  for  journahstic  treatment.  Yet  they 
enjoy  no  privilege,  but  must  accept  the  common 
fortune.  While  the  preacher  may  be  anxiously 
debating  with  himself  whether  he  can  wisely 
discuss  some  difficult  question  of  science  or 
criticism  which  seems  to  conflict  with  the  Chris- 
tian faith,  and  how  best  he  shall  guard  his  words 
against  such  a  misconception  as  may  imperil 
the  simple  beliefs  of  his  hearers,  his  hand  may 
be,  probably  will  be,  forced  by  the  editors  of  the 
popular  journals,  who  will  have  the  whole  matter 
before  the  public  in  its  most  provocative  and 
sensational,  which  means  its  least  serviceable 
and  accurate,  aspect.  No  previous  generation 
of  Christian  preachers  has  had  to  face  such  a 
contingency,  and  how  best  to  do  so  is  hard  to 
discover.  In  saying  this  I  do  not,  of  course, 
forget  that  modern  journaHsm  is  capable  of 
doing  much  for  reUgion  and  morality,  and  may 
put  into  the  hands  of  the  preacher  a  new  and 


2IO      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

potent  instrument  of  spiritual  influence:  but  I 
am  now  concerned  with  the  special  difficulties  of 
our  time,  and  amongst  them  must  certainly  be 
reckoned  the  influence  of  popular  journalism. 

V.  Baleful  influence  of  the  so-called  religious 
press.  The  preacher  who  would  criticise  con- 
ventional beliefs,  and  pursue  a  course  adverse 
to  the  prevailing  policy  of  his  church,  must 
sustain  the  opposition  of  the  rehgious,  that  is, 
of  the  party,  press.  His  words  will  be  torn  from 
their  context;  distorted  into  senses  which  were 
foreign  to  his  mind;  paraded  before  an  excited 
and  ignorant  pubHc  without  any  of  the  reserva- 
tions with  which  he  had  conditioned  them.  His 
explanations  will  be  ignored:  he  may  count 
himself  fortunate  if  his  personal  character  is 
not  mahgned.  One  of  the  gravest  facts  of  our 
time  is  the  power  for  evil  of  the  "rehgious" 
press.  No  instrument  for  the  enslavement  of 
human  understandings  and  the  persecution  of 
individuals  can  surpass  what  modern  Roman 
CathoHcs  call  la  bonne  presse.  An  impressive 
illustration  of  its  power  was  recently  provided 
by  the  clerical  journals  in  France,  which  played 
a  conspicuous  and  shameful  part  in  the  tragedy 
of  Dreyfus.  At  the  present  time  the  Modern- 
ists are  being  subjected  to  the  same  mahgnant 
influence.  Unblushing  and  persistent  assertion 
is  the  normal  method:  the  manufacture  of  panic 
is  the  grand  object.     There  is  something  in  the 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      211 

condition  of  the  modern  world  which  is  extremely 
favourable  to  this  procedure.  The  masses  are 
still  too  illiterate  and  inexperienced  to  criticise 
what  they  read,  or  to  question  the  authority  of 
the  printed  page.  They  are  little  likely  to  sus- 
pect that  there  is  any  other  side  of  a  debated 
question  than  that  which  is  placed  before  them 
with  oracular  decisiveness.  "Heresy  hunts"  can 
thus  be  quickly  raised:  and  reputations  created 
or  destroyed  to  order.  In  the  Protestant  churches 
the  level  of  average  intelligence  is  higher,  and 
the  traditions  of  fair  play  are  stronger.  Yet 
even  there  the  influence  of  sectarian  newspapers 
is  powerful  and  mischievous.  Let  the  preacher 
take  all  possible  pains  to  guard  against  doctrinal 
lopsidedness,  and  he  may  find  that  the  false 
emphasis,  which  he  had  avoided,  has  been  eagerly 
provided  by  the  garbled  extracts  and  inflamma- 
tory comments  of  the  religious  press.  It  is  a 
curious  and  depressing  speculation  why  journal- 
ism which  specifically  concerns  itself  with  rehg- 
ious  affairs,  and  is  indeed  commonly  the  work 
of  Christian  ministers,  should  fall  conspicuously 
below  the  modest  level  of  morality  attained  by 
the  journalism  which  is  frankly  secular.  The 
fact  is  undoubted;  and  the  scandal  is  great;  but 
the  causes  are  obscure  and  the  remedies  hidden. 
The  modern  preacher,  then,  labours  under 
considerable  disadvantages,  which  renders  his 
fulfilment  of  duty  far  more  difficult  than  was 


212        THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

formerly  the  case.  Inasmuch,  however,  as  these 
disadvantages  have  no  connection  with  his  per- 
sonal fault,  but  inhere  in  the  conditions  under 
which  his  ministry  must  be  carried  on,  he  need 
not  be  unduly  depressed.  More  careful  he 
ought  to  be,  but  not  less  courageous.  Let  him 
remember  that  there  have  been  former  times  of 
transition  in  the  long  history  of  Christianity, 
and  that  these  presented,  not  indeed  the  same 
problems,  but  problems  which  to  the  men  who 
had  to  solve  them  appeared  not  less  difhcult. 
Looking  back  on  the  past  we  can  see  that  those 
were  most  serviceable  to  truth  who  embraced 
the  risks  of  change.  We  must  never  forget  that 
we  are  the  spiritual  children  of  the  reformers, 
themselves  the  courageous  innovators  of  their 
time.  Too  often,  indeed,  loyalty  to  the  Refor- 
mation is  strangely  represented  as  identical  with 
an  imintelligent  perpetuation  of  the  doctrinal 
forms,  and  even  of  the  ecclesiastical  arrange- 
ments, of  the  reformers:  but  manifestly  their 
example  requires  us  to  welcome  new  truth,  not 
to  stereotype  old  formulge.  Such  loyalty  is 
really  only  a  shabby  version  of  Mediaevalism. 
Father  Tyrrell  has  contrasted  MediaevaHsm 
and  Modernism  in  these  words:  "The  difference 
is  that  whereas  the  Mediasvalist  regards  the 
expression  of  Catholicism,  formed  by  the  syn- 
thesis between  faith  and  the  general  culture  of 
the  thirteenth  century,  as  primitive  and  as  prac- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      213 

tically  final  and  exhaustive,  the  Modernist 
denies  the  possibility  of  such  finality  and  holds 
that  the  task  is  unending  just  because  the  process 
of  culture  is  unending."  ^ 

Modernists  in  some  sense  we  must  be  if  we 
are  faithful  to  the  tradition  of  the  Reformers. 
No  considerations  of  prudence  can  authorize  a 
repudiation  of  our  spiritual  birthright;  at  all 
hazards  our  "liberty  of  prophesying"  must  be 
preserved  intact.  To  every  appeal  which  im- 
plies any  tampering  with  that  sacred  heritage, 
we  reply  in  the  manly  words  of  S.  Paul:  "With 
freedom  did  Christ  set  us  free:  stand  fast  there- 
fore and  be  not  entangled  again  in  a  yoke  of 
bondage."  WTien,  however,  the  point  of  prin- 
ciple has  been  definitely  secured,  we  are  imper- 
atively required  to  heed  the  requirement  of 
charity.  The  claims  of  the  "  weaker  brother"  must 
be  fairly  met,  and  no  measure  of  self-suppres- 
sion, that  is  consistent  with  moral  fidelity,  is 
too  great  to  be  asked  of  us.  Charity  insists 
that  in  setting  forth  truth  that  is  novel  and 
therefore  disturbing,  we  most  avoid  scrupulously 
all  unnecessary  offence,  and  of  such  offence 
surely  none  is  more  culpable  and  injurious  than 
that  caused  by  the  undue  emphasis  which  makes 
our  teaching  lopsided,  and  distorts  the  perspec- 
tive of  Christian  faith. 

^v.  "Mediaevalism,"  p.  146. 


VIII 

OBJECTIONS  AND   CONCLUSIONS 

In  the  course  of  our  discussion  we  have  claimed 
for  the  Christian  preacher  the  right  to  think 
freely,  and  to  speak  freely,  within  the  limits 
prescribed  by  personal  discipleship  and  pastoral 
duty.  Such  "Liberty  of  Prophesying"  may  be 
criticised  from  two  points  of  view.  From  the 
side  of  the  Church,  it  may  be  urged  that  it  im- 
plies a  perilous  belittlement  of  the  authority 
both  of  the  doctrinal  tradition  and  of  the  eccle- 
siastical executive.  From  the  side  of  the  preacher 
it  may  be  maintained  that  functions  are  accu- 
mulated on  him  beyond  his  powers.  These 
criticisms  are  too  important  to  be  ignored,  and 
too  plausible  to  be  neglected. 

I.  It  is,  of  course,  apparent  that  the  whole 
discussion  has  proceeded  on  the  Protestant  hy- 
pothesis of  the  Church.  Any  notion  of  eccle- 
siastical infallibiHty  inhering  in  the  decisions  of 
the  clerical  executive  is  plainly  inconsistent  with 
it.  The  doctrinal  tradition  of  Christendom  must 
be  conceived  of  differently  by  the  Protestant 
and  by  the  Catholic:  but  the  difference  has  been 
214 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       215 

very  gradually  perceived,  and  is  still  far  from 
being  realized.  There  is  indeed  no  slight  con- 
fusion in  the  Catholic  ranks.  The  older  doc- 
trine, which  received  classical  expression  in  the 
controversial  writings  of  Bossuet,  supposed 
that  a  developed  theology,  coherent  and  com- 
plete, had  been  originally  delivered  to  the  Apostles, 
and  was  produced  by  their  successors  as  the 
necessities  of  the  Church  required.  Its  Divine 
origin  was  held  to  be  sufficiently  authenticated 
by  its  unique  immunity  from  that  law  of  change 
which  governs  all  terrestrial  things.  It  was 
semper  eadem,  an  unaltered  and  unalterable 
faith,  confronting  the  unending  variations  of 
Protestant  theory  with  the  same  calm  aspect  of 
eternal  truth  which  the  Spirit  of  Truth  Himself 
had  impressed  on  it  at  the  start.  The  visible 
oneness  of  the  Church  was  matched  by  the  one- 
ness of  its  doctrine.  So  Dryden  pictured  the 
contrast  in  his  controversial  poem: 

One  in  herself,  not  rent  by  schism  but  sound, 

Entire,  one  solid  shining  diamond; 

Not  sparkles  shatter'd  into  sects  like  you: 

One  is  the  Church,  and  must  be  to  be  true: 

One  central  principle  of  unity. 

As  undivided,  so  from  errors  free, 

As  one  in  faith,  so  one  in  sanctity. 

Thus  one,  thus  pure,  behold  her  largely  spread. 

Like  the  fair  ocean  from  her  mother's  bed; 

From  east  to  west  triumphantly  she  rides, 

All  shores  are  watered  by  her  wealthy  tides. 


2i6      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

The  Gospel  sound,  diffused  from  pole  to  pole, 
Where  winds  can  carry,  and  where  waves  can  roll, 
The  self-same  doctrine  of  the  sacred  page 
Convey'd  to  every  clime,  in  every  age.i 

The  appeal  to  history  was  fatal  to  this  view 
of  the  Church,  and,  in  point  of  fact,  it  has  few 
defenders  now,  although  it  remains  the  official 
doctrine  of  the  Roman  Church.  It  has  been 
replaced  in  formal  apologies  by  various  forms  of 
that  theory  of  ecclesiastical  development  which 
is  commonly  attributed  to  Newman,  and  which 
at  least  avoids  the  obvious  difficulties  of  the 
older  doctrine.  It  has,  however,  other  and  per- 
haps not  less  formidable  difficulties  of  its  own. 
Evolutionary  infalliblists  are  led  to  the  perplex- 
ing conclusion  that  the  latest  phases  of  the  doc- 
trinal tradition  are  the  truest,  and  that  the  least 
satisfying  version  of  the  Gospel  is  that  of  the 
Apostles.  The  perception  of  this  paradox  reaUy 
determined  the  action  of  the  reformers  when 
they  pleaded  the  authority  of  Scripture  against 
the  doctrinal  tradition  of  the  infallible  Church. 
The  paradox  inheres  in  every  theory  of  the 
Church  which  sets  it  above  the  New  Testament. 
"We  Protestants,"  said  Burnet,  shortly  "found 
our  religion  merely  on  the  Scriptures,"  a  state- 
ment which  must  be  supposed  to  mean  that  the 
apostolic  version  of  the  Christian  revelation  is 
the  rule  of  faith  for  all  time,  and  the  criterion  of 

'  V.  "The  Hind  and  the  Panther,"  Part  II,  526  f. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       217 

theological  development.  No  Protestant  could 
ever  say  of  the  Scriptures  with  Father  Tyrrell, 
that  "after  aU  they  are  but  a  few  chance  leaves 
torn  from  the  book  of  tradition."  ^ 

The  doctrinal  tradition  of  Christendom  has 
no  validity  in  Protestant  eyes  against  the  teach- 
ing of  the  New  Testament,  and  all  theological 
development  must  on  the  Protestant  hypothesis 
be  conditioned  by  fidelity  to  the  primitive  and 
unalterable  norm  of  truth.  This  position  seemed 
comparatively  simple  when  the  New  Testament 
was  held  to  carry  a  plain  meaning,  and  to  hold 
an  impregnable  position.  The  special  difficulty 
of  the  present  time  arises  from  the  new  con- 
sciousness that  neither  of  these  suppositions  is 
permissible.  We  have  to  recognize  in  the  relig- 
ious interpretation  of  the  apostolic  witness  a 
problem  of  great  perplexity,  and  in  the  defence 
of  the  New  Testament  as  the  rule  of  faith  an 
apologetic  task  of  primary  importance.  The 
doctrinal  tradition  of  Christendom,  moreover,  is 
not  a  clear-cut  authoritative  body  of  truth,  set 
forth  in  the  formal  decisions  of  ecclesiastical 
assemblies  in  the  past,  and  capable  of  precise 
authoritative  formulation  in  the  present.  The 
statutory  Anglican  position  which  ascribes  author- 
ity to  the  decrees  of  the  first  four  general  councils, 
but  repudiates  those  of  later  assemblies,  is  only 
tenable  as  a  provisional  arrangement,  intended  to 

^v.  "Medieevalism,"  p.  55. 


2i8      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

tide  over  a  crisis.  It  cannot  be  grounded  on  any 
recognized  ecclesiastical  principle,  and  it  is 
plainly  illogical.  Every  recognition  of  ecclesias- 
tical development  implies  a  belief  in  the  contin- 
uous action  of  the  Holy  Spirit  within  the  Christian 
society,  and  prohibits  the  arbitrary  selection  of 
periods  of  ecclesiastical  history,  and  the  cloth- 
ing them  with  exclusive  authority.  The  spirit 
of  Christ  is  as  truly  in  the  Church  of  the  twen- 
tieth century  as  in  that  of  the  fourth,  and  His 
leading  of  one  generation  is  never  such  as  to 
relieve  the  next  of  its  responsibility,  or  to  deprive 
it  of  His  guidance.  The  "Witness  of  the  Spirit," 
however,  cannot  be  limited  to  the  official  deci- 
sions of  the  clergy  in  any  age,  but  manifests  itself 
in  the  whole  process  of  Christian  life  and  thought. 
It  is  most  apparent,  perhaps,  where  it  is  least 
expected  and  least  recognized.  The  moral  ad- 
vance of  the  Church  revealed  in  the  new  sensi- 
tiveness to  all  forms  of  oppression,  the  new 
respect  for  the  individual  conscience,  the  exalta- 
tion of  those  natural  relationships  which  find 
expression  in  domestic  life,  is  surely  far  more 
truly  the  effect  of  the  Spirit's  leading  than  the 
vast  fabric  of  theological  dogma  and  moral 
speculation  which  is  found  in  concihar  decrees 
and  canons,  in  the  tomes  of  patristic  divinity 
and  in  the  voluminous  writings  of  the  casuists. 
Yet,  from  the  Catholic  point  of  view,  the  last 
alone  can  be  formally  treated  as  possessing  in  a 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING      219 

measure  Divine  authority,  for  the  clerical  execu- 
tive, w^hich  ex  hypothesi  is  the  organ  of  the  Spirit's 
guidance,  cannot  directly  concern  itself  with  the 
first.  On  the  Protestant  view  of  the  Church 
the  authority  of  the  clerical  executive  shrinks  to 
the  modest  dimension  of  a  disciplinary  conces- 
sion. The  preacher  defers  to  it  so  far  as  law 
compels  and  conscience  permits,  but  never 
concedes  to  it  any  power  to  coerce  his  thought, 
or  remove  from  him  his  personal  responsibiHty. 
It  is  a  practical  question  for  ecclesiastical  states- 
men whether  the  legal  requirement  shall  be  strict 
or  lax,  the  liberty  recognized  be  small  or  large. 
We  have  maintained  the  wisdom  of  restricting 
the  claim  of  external  authority  within  the  nar- 
rowest limits  consistent  with  the  interest  of 
spiritual  rehgion  and  the  peace  of  the  Church; 
we  have  pointed  out  that  in  most  Protestant 
churches  at  the  present  time  those  hmits  are 
transgressed  by  denominational  subscriptions 
which  inflict  hardships  and  humiliation  on 
preachers,  and  bring  on  rehgion  no  sHght  dis- 
credit. The  soundness  of  these  positions  is 
shown  not  merely  by  the  distress  and  embar- 
rassment of  individuals,  but  far  more  impres- 
sively by  the  general  admission  that  the 
distinctive  denominational  beliefs  have  every- 
where lost  most  of  their  old  importance,  so  that 
the  question  is  being  raised  and  debated  within 
all   the    Protestant    churches    of    the    English- 


220       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

speaking  world,  whether  the  ecclesiastical  systems 
which  were  built  on  doctrinal  bases,  which  are 
failing,  ought  any  longer  to  be  maintained.  The 
solidarity  of  Protestant  belief  and  the  substantial 
agreement  of  Protestant  doctrine  are  implied  in 
the  now  common  practice  of  interchanging  pul- 
pits. When  so  much  may  be  postulated,  the 
raison  d'etre  of  denominational  separation  would 
seem  to  be  failing.  Preachers  in  the  past  were 
the  principal  organizers  of  Protestant  sectarian- 
ism: they  may  be  destined  to  become  the 
prophets  of  Protestant  unity. 

II.  The  objection  that  the  "Liberty  of  Pro- 
phesying," which  has  in  this  discussion  been 
claimed  for  the  Christian  preacher,  implies  the 
accumulation  of  functions  on  him  wholly  beyond 
his  capacity,  deserves  to  be  carefully  considered. 
Can  the  ordinary  preacher  be  reasonably  or 
prudently  encouraged,  or  even  permitted,  to 
undertake  an  independent  examination  of  doc- 
trinal and  critical  questions,  which  have  been 
formally  settled  by  the  ecclesiastical  authority, 
which  presumably  he  recognizes?  Can  he  be 
fairly  supposed  to  have  at  his  disposal  the  time, 
the  knowledge,  and  the  mental  training,  which 
are  needed  for  the  work?  Can  the  Church 
safely  tolerate  a  liberty  which,  for  its  right  exer- 
cise, demands  qualities  which,  there  is  good  rea- 
son for  thinldng,  comparatively  few  of  the  clergy 
possess?    In  view  of  all  the  circumstances  of  the 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       221 

modern  Church  —  the  low  intellectual  level  of 
average  clergyman,  the  haste  and  distraction 
which  ordinarily  mark  clerical  life,  the  extreme 
complexity  of  critical  and  doctrinal  discussions, 
the  grave  spiritual  consequences  of  ignorant 
handling  of  religious  questions  in  public,  and  so 
forth  —  would  it  not  be  the  wisest  course  to 
accept  a  delimitation  of  functions,  and  a  corre- 
sponding variety  of  system,  reserving  to  academic 
circles  of  critical  and  theological  specialists  the 
right  to  treat  freely  of  debated  subjects,  and  hold- 
ing preachers  rigorously  to  the  registered  deci- 
sions of  ecclesiastical  authority? 

It  might,  perhaps,  be  sufficient  to  reply  that, 
whatever  the  risks  of  allowing  liberty  to  the 
preachers  may  be,  no  other  course  is  any  longer 
possible.  The  subject  has  long  been  stripped  of 
obscurity;  even  its  technical  terms  are  passing  on 
the  lips  of  men  in  ordinary  conversation.  The 
decisive  issues  are  debated  in  newspaper  articles, 
in  widely  read  magazines,  in  cheap  books. 
Every  moderately  educated  man  has  to  his  hand 
the  conclusions  of  the  specialists  set  forth,  often 
with  much  literary  skill,  in  his  mother  tongue. 
The  arguments  offered  are  in  no  special  degree 
obscure  or  technical;  they  have  an  aspect  of 
taking  familiarity,  appealing  to  reason  and  good 
sense,  and  only  assuming  critical  principles 
which  are  already  accepted  in  the  case  of  every 
history  and  literature  save  those  of  Israel.     If, 


222       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

then,  the  public  discussion  of  Biblical  criticism 
be  regrettable,  the  blame  must  lie,  not  with  the 
preachers,  who  can  hardly  be  said  to  have  any 
choice  in  the  matter,  but  with  those  eminent 
scholars  who  for  purposes  of  their  own  have 
popularized  the  results  of  their  studies  in  a 
multitude  of  cheap  publications.  The  most  we 
can  now  do  is  to  insist  that  the  free  handling  of 
Scripture  in  the  pulpit  shall  be  conditioned  by 
adequate  knowledge,  by  pastoral  duty,  above  all, 
by  deep  and  sustained  reverence.  The  time  has 
for  ever  passed  in  which  critical  discussions 
could  be  confined  to  professed  critics  in  aca- 
demic spheres. 

Even  if  the  case  were  otherwise,  such  restric- 
tion of  liberty  would  not  be  desirable.  Hardly 
any  danger  to  Christianity  is  greater  than  that 
implied  in  a  recognized  severance  between  the 
scholars  and  the  teachers  of  the  Church.  This 
severance,  however,  is  a  familiar  feature  of 
Christian  experience.  It  appeals  to  the  vanity 
of  the  scholar,  to  the  practical  sense  of  the  teacher, 
to  the  ambition  of  the  ecclesiastical  politician, 
to  the  timidity  of  the  religious  conservative. 
It  is  always  threatening  the  Church,  but  in  times 
of  religious  transition,  which  are  always  also 
times  of  intellectual  activity,  it  assumes  a  greater 
plausibility,  and  seems  to  receive  the  general 
sanction.  Two  famous  crises  may  be  recalled  to 
mind  with  advantage.     The  first  contact  of  the 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      223 

Gospel  with  Greek  thought  coincided  with  a 
disposition  to  separate  the  knowledge  of  the  few 
from  the  faith  of  the  many.  Gnosticism  has 
a  curiously  modern  aspect.  It  anticipates  some 
of  the  questions  which  agitate  the  modern  Church, 
and  illustrates  tendencies  which  are  powerfully 
affecting  ourselves.  Little  alteration  of  Han- 
sel's description  of  the  ancient  gnostics  is  needed 
in  order  to  adapt  it  to  the  situation  with  which 
we  are  confronted. 

"Gnosticism  revived  the  idea,  familiar  to 
heathen  thought  but  wholly  alien  to  the  spirit 
of  Christianity,  of  one  religion  designed  for  the 
wise  and  the  initiated,  and  another  for  the  igno- 
rant and  profane  vulgar.  Faith,  the  founda- 
tion of  Christian  knowledge,  was  fitted  only  for 
the  rude  mass,  the  i/'^xiKot^  or  animal  men,  who 
were  incapable  of  higher  things.  Far  above 
these  were  the  privileged  natures,  the  men  of 
intellect,  the  -n-vtvimTiKol^  or  spiritual  men,  whose 
vocation  was  not  to  believe,  but  to  know.  .  .  . 

"Such  a  distinction,  as  Neander  has  well 
observed,  was  natural  in  the  heathen  systems  of 
antiquity,  because  heathenism  was  destitute  of 
any  independent  means,  adapted  alike  to  all 
stages  of  human  enlightenment,  for  satisfying 
man's  rehgious  needs.  Such  a  means,  however, 
was  supplied  in  Christianity  by  a  faith  in  great 
historical  facts,  on  which  the  religious  convic- 
tions of  all  men  alike  were  to  depend.     Gnosti- 


224      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

cism,  by  a  reactionary  process,  tended  to  make 
religion  forfeit  the  freedom  gained  for  it  by 
Christ,  and  to  make  it  again  dependent  on 
human  speculations.  Christianity  had  furnished 
a  simple  and  universally  intelligible  solution  of 
every  enigma  which  had  occupied  thinking  minds 
—  a  practical  answer  to  all  the  questions  which 
speculation  had  busied  itself  in  vain  to  answer. 
It  established  a  temper  of  mind  by  which  doubts 
that  could  not  be  resolved  by  the  efforts  of  specu- 
lative reason  were  to  be  practically  vanquished. 
But  gnosticism  wished  to  make  religion  once 
more  dependent  on  a  speculative  solution  of 
these  questions.  Religion  was  to  be  founded, 
not  on  historical  facts,  but  on  ontological  ideas: 
through  speculations  on  existence  in  general  and 
its  necessary  evolutions,  men  were  to  be  led  to 
a  comprehension  of  the  true  meaning  of  what 
Christianity  represents  under  a  historical  veil. 
The  motto  of  the  gnostic  might  be  exactly  given 
in  the  words  of  a  distinguished  modern  philos- 
opher, '  Men  are  saved,  not  by  the  historical,  but 
by  the  metaphysical.'"* 

This  gnostic  attitude  of  mind  is  very  common 
at  the  present  time,  and  is  disclosed  whenever 
some  injudiciously  crude  utterance  of  the  popu- 
lar teacher  raises  a  clamour  in  the  rehgious  world 
against  the  "new  criticism."  The  responsible 
authors   of   the   unpopular   opinions   hold   their 

'  V.  "The  Gnostic  Heresies,"  p.  lo. 


THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       225 

peace,  and  stand  apart  in  the  temper  of  academic 
superciliousness,  while  their  imprudent  or  too 
honest  disciple  is  left  to  his  fate.  An  even 
closer  parallel  to  the  situation  of  the  modern 
church  is  presented  at  the  time  of  the  Renais- 
sance. Then  the  divergence  between  popular 
belief  and  educated  opinion  was  wider  than 
perhaps  it  has  ever  been  before  or  since.  The 
Humanists,  who  were  the  Modernists  of  the 
time,  "adopted  the  conception  of  combining 
Platonism  and  Christianity  in  an  eclectic  mysti- 
cism which  was  to  be  the  esoteric  Christianity 
for  thinkers  and  educated  men,  while  the  popular 
Christianity,  with  its  superstitions,  was  needed 
for  the  common  herd." 

Professor  Lindsay  points  out  the  essentially 
non-religious  temper  of  Humanism:  "The  author- 
ity which  the  Humanists  revolted  against  was 
merely  intellectual,  as  was  the  freedom  fought 
for.  It  did  not  belong  to  their  mission  to  pro- 
claim a  spiritual  freedom  or  to  free  the  common 
man  from  his  slavish  fear  of  the  mediaeval  priest- 
hood; and  this  made  an  impassable  gulf  between 
their  aspirations  and  those  of  Luther  and  the 
real  leaders  of  the  Reformation  movement."  * 

The  effect  of  estabUshing  a  distinction  between 
the  professed  scholar  and  the  official  teacher, 
tolerating  the  largest  liberty  in  academic  circles 
while  insisting  on  severely  restraining  the  Hb- 

^v.  "  History  of  the  Reformation,"  vol.  I,  p.  65. 


226      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

erty  of  preachers,  is  mischievous  both  on  pro- 
fessed scholars  and  on  preachers.  The  latter 
are  held  down  to  conditions  of  ministry  which 
are  intrinsically  degrading,  and  which  indeed  no 
honourable  man  could  permanently  accept.  The 
former  are  freed  from  responsibilities  which 
properly  attach  to  the  Christian's  scholar's 
position,  and  which  none  can  ignore  without  the 
gravest  risks  to  truth.  A  dangerous  breach 
between  educated  thought  and  official  teaching 
is  created,  and  must  necessarily  grow  wider  until 
a  complete  divorce  has  been  effected.  When 
that  result  has  been  reached,  there  is  but  short 
life  left  for  intellectual  liberty  even  in  academic 
circles.  The  conscience  of  honest  men  revolts 
against  a  duahsm  which  has  the  aspect  of  gross 
hypocrisy:  the  deeps  of  unintelligent  piety  are 
stirred  by  some  clear  call  of  sincere  fanaticism; 
and  the  denouement  of  the  policy  of  immoral 
expediency  is  the  triumph  of  a  persecuting 
obscurantism. 

Accepting,  then,  with  open  eyes  the  con- 
siderable risks  involved  in  giving  fuU  hberty  to 
preachers,  within  the  terms  of  the  Christian 
discipleship,  we  must  find  the  only  efifective 
securities  against  didactic  extravagance  in  the 
maintenance  of  a  high  standard  of  pastoral  duty, 
in  the  sound  education  of  the  clergy,  and  in  the 
encouragement  among  them  of  those  habits  of 
study  and  devotion  which  at  once  illumine  and 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING      227 

discipline  the  mind.  The  first  will  secure  the 
considerate  caution  and  long-suffering  patience 
of  charity;  the  next,  largeness  of  view  and  a  basis 
of  sound  learning;  the  last,  that  union  of  intel- 
lectual sympathy  and  deep  reverence  which  is 
the  true  distinctive  note  of  Christian  culture. 

Something  has  already  been  said  as  to  the 
advantages  of  uniting  the  preaching  with  the 
pastoral  function.  Here  it  may  suffice  to  point 
out  the  security  against  mere  intellectualism 
which  it  provides.  The  pastor  is  not  primarily 
concerned  with  the  questions  which  agitate 
scholars  and  divines :  he  has  to  deal  with  the  great 
undisputed  fundamental  verities  of  religion,  and 
to  bring  them  effectually  to  bear  on  individual 
lives.  In  teaching  the  young,  in  comforting  the 
bereaved,  in  remonstrating  with  the  sinful,  in 
restoring  the  penitent,  in  solving  the  problems 
of  simple  souls,  in  visiting  the  sick,  in  sustaining 
in  their  last  conflict  the  dying,  the  preacher 
discovers  the  deeper  truths,  and  the  deeper  mean- 
ing of  truths,  which  in  the  excitement  of  con- 
troversy, and  the  sword-play  of  critical  argument, 
are  lost  from  view.  He  will  find  himself  as 
a  matter  of  course  holding  his  theories  rigor- 
ously to  their  spiritual  implications,  and  impos- 
ing moral  conditions  on  his  intellectual  tolerance. 
The  late  Dr.  Bigg,  himself  a  fine  example  of  the 
combination  of  the  preacher  and  the  scholar, 
has  made  some  wise  observations  on  this  point. 


228      THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

Let  me  quote  a  short  passage  from  his  addresses 
on  "The  Trials  and  Blessings  of  a  Scholar's 
Life,"  which  have  been  posthumously  pubhshed: 

"But  now,  if  the  Truth  is  a  Person,  the  chief 
of  all  intellectual  dangers  must  He  in  Abstrac- 
tion. Yet  Abstraction  is  the  scholar's  weapon, 
the  keen-edged  tool  with  which  he  forces  his 
way  into  the  rocky  fastness  of  knowledge. 

"And  so  indeed  it  is  the  greatest  of  perils.  The 
habit  of  abstract  thought  is  the  arch-trial  out  of 
which  flow  all  kinds  of  aberration. 

"You  may  see  this  in  little  superficial  things. 
The  student  is  very  often  rather  odd,  eccentric, 
absent-minded.  People  do  not  expect  him  to 
be  practical.  'He  is  a  man  of  books,'  they  say, 
'and  his  head  is  in  the  clouds.'  The  parish  is 
always  surprised  when  the  clergyman  proves  to 
have  any  business  capacity.  .  .  .  The  student  as 
such  is  only  half  a  man.  He  is  a  thinking  ma- 
chine, and  always  needs  to  recall  the  fact  that 
the  logical  apparatus  is  not  the  whole  of  him. 
The  artist  and  the  poet  and  the  saint  have  their 
truth  as  well  as  the  thinker.  The  Platonists 
held  that  the  lover  also  is  a  discoverer,  that  mere 
human  affection  is  a  great  teacher.  And  surely 
it  is  so.  .  .  . 

"  Shall  we  say  that  truth  of  knowledge  comes 
through  study,  but  truth  of  being  through  love 
in  action?  Love  forms  character,  while  study 
discipUnes  talent,  and  hence  Goethe  said  that 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING      229 

'talent  grows  best  in  solitude,  but  character  is 
moulded  in  the  stream  of  the  world.'  .  .  .  '  By 
these  considerations  you  may  test  every  ideal 
that  men  pursue.  The  more  concrete  it  is  the 
greater  will  be  its  truth.  Vaguest  and  most 
abstract  of  all  is  humanitarianism.  And  there- 
fore it  is  inevitably  cruel.  Often  we  stand 
aghast  at  the  contrast  between  the  tender  words 
and  the  barbarous  actions  of  the  friends  of  human- 
ity. But  in  a  University  the  most  seductive  of 
all  false  ideals  is  that  of  self-culture.  .  .  . 

"The  cry  of  human  affection  and  human  trouble 
comes  from  without  and  is  answered  from  within. 
You  must  deal  with  it,  because  you  are  not  stu- 
dents only,  but  men.  Not  in  bread  alone  nor 
in  books  alone  will  you  find  the  staff  of  life. 
Our  Saviour  is  there  where  living  men  and 
women  need  our  help.  'Thou  hast  seen  thy 
brother,'  says  an  old  mystic,  'thou  hast  seen 
God."'i 

Therefore,  in  the  interest  of  religious  truth 
itself,  we  must  not  tolerate  any  isolation  of  the 
scholar;  in  the  interest  of  indispensable  religious 
liberty  we  must  not  tolerate  any  arbitrary  re- 
straint of  the  preacher.  The  parochial  preacher, 
who  is  also  a  student,  will  often  be  tempted  to 
resent  the  interruptions  to  which  he  is  exposed, 
and  the  relatively  Hmited  opportunities  for  study 
which  are  all  that  his  pastoral  duties  will  permit; 

^v.  "The  Spirit  of  Christ  in  Common  Life,"  p.  13  f. 


230       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

but  let  him  remember  that  in  these  circumstances 
of  his  intellectual  work  lie  the  safeguards  against 
many  errors,  to  which  the  unhindered  student  of 
the  college  or  the  cloister  Hes  exposed.  It  might, 
perhaps,  go  without  saying  that  no  reasonable 
man  would  attempt,  and  no  modest  man  would 
desire,  to  handle  difficult  and  debated  religious 
questions  in  pubhc  without  an  adequate  equip- 
ment of  knowledge,  adequate,  that  is,  to  the 
handling  which  is  ventured;  yet  it  would  argue 
little  candour  on  my  part  if  I  did  not  acknowl- 
edge that  recent  experience,  not  on  one  side  only 
of  the  chronic  conflict  between  authority  and 
freedom,  has  shown  that  this  supposition  can- 
not be  made.  The  tendency  towards  special- 
ization, which  moulds  the  intellectual  effort  of 
our  time,  has  nowhere  led  to  more  unfortunate 
results  than  in  the  sphere  of  clerical  education. 
In  England,  perhaps  more  than  in  any  other 
country,  the  clergyman  has  hitherto  come  to  his 
ordination  without  technical  or  professional 
training.  He  has  been  educated  in  school  and 
university  precisely  in  the  same  way  as  the  lay- 
man, and  such  professional  knowledge  as  he 
requires  has  been  gained  after  ordination.  In 
such  a  system  there  are  obviously  great  disad- 
vantages, but,  perhaps,  even  greater  advantages. 
At  least  the  narrowing  effect  of  a  clerical  career 
is  mitigated,  and  a  wholesome  largeness  of  inter- 
est is   induced.    Within  recent  years,  however, 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING      231 

clerical  education  has  to  a  great  extent  become 
professional.  The  theological  seminary  is  rap- 
idly replacing  the  university  as  the  scene  of  the 
clergyman's  education.  Already  the  effect  is  as 
marked  as  it  is  unfortunate.  Wliat  the  French 
call  a  special  "mentahty"  is  generated  in  the 
theological  college,  separating  the  clergyman 
from  the  sympathy,  and  almost  from  the  com- 
prehension, of  the  layman.  Perhaps  inevitably 
the  theological  seminary  flourishes  most  as  the 
organ  of  sacerdotalized  Christianity.  Its  im- 
portance in  the  ecclesiastical  system  waxes  as 
evangeUcal  religion  wanes.  Hence  the  seminary- 
bred  preachers  carry  into  the  pulpit  the  bold 
dogmatism  in  which  they  have  been  trained, 
and  which  reflects  the  calculated  ignorance  in 
which  they  have  been  kept.  The  last  secures 
the  sincerity  of  the  first,  but  cannot  lessen  its 
potency  of  mischief,  the  extreme  injustice  which 
it  may  inflict  on  individuals,  or  the  discredit 
which  it  must  bring  on  the  Church. 

"Resist  the  estabhshment  of  Seminaries  in 
the  Church  of  England,"  said  a  leading  modern- 
ist to  me  recently;  "they  are  the  root  of  all  our 
troubles  in  the  Church  of  Rome." 

This  danger,  perhaps,  is  pecuHar  to  the  Church 
of  England,  but  that  cannot  be  said  of  the  defect 
which  marks  not  the  training,  but  the  intellect- 
ual habit,  of  many  modern  preachers.  I  may 
best  convey  what  I  would  wish  to  say  on  this 


232       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

subject  by  borrowing  the  words  of  an  illustrious 
scholar,  whose  name  is  honoured  by  aU  English- 
speaking  students,  the  late  Bishop  Stubbs.  In 
his  second  visitation  charge,  delivered  in  1893, 
he  dealt  with  the  clergyman's  reading.  After 
pointing  out  the  risks  of  miscellaneous  reading, 
and  the  foUy  of  reading  bad  fiction,  he  warned 
his  clergy  against  the  notion  that  "the  real 
knowledge  on  which  alone  they  could  frame 
real  and  independent  views"  could  be  gained 
from  "reviews,  didactic  articles,  symposiums  of 
real  writers,  and  imaginary  conversations  of 
unreal  ones."  Then  he  proceeded  to  speak 
of  more  serious  study: 

"The  caution  to  be  administered  in  reference 
to  more  recondite  reading  is  more  serious.  There 
are  many  books  in  men's  hands  just  now,  edify- 
ing and  profitable  to  those  who  have  had  the 
training  to  understand  them,  and  judge  of  the 
good  and  evil  that  is  in  them,  but  by  no  means 
fit  to  be  taken  in  hand  unadvisedly,  lightly,  or 
wantonly.  And  here  let  me  remark  how  unmit- 
igatedly  painful  it  is  to  me  sometimes  to  hear, 
and  to  hear  of,  sermons  preached  by  young  men 
who  have  read  the  advanced  book  without  hav- 
ing worked  out  at  aU  the  elements  of  the  philos- 
ophy or  history  upon  which  its  conclusions  are 
framed.  It  is  so  in  history,  it  is  so  in  political 
science,  it  is  so  in  theological  reading,  as  well  as 
the  criticism  of  texts  and  the  analysis  of  physical 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       233 

forces  and  phenomena.  The  reader  who  begins 
at  the  beginning  has,  as  soon  as  he  begins,  won 
half  his  way  to  the  conclusion;  the  reader  who 
begins  with  the  conclusions  is  storing  up  for  him- 
self a  happy  reserve  of  repentance  and  some 
disciplinary  lessons  which  will  have  a  real  value 
as  the  conviction  of  his  own  ignorance  is  forced 
upon  him. 

"  Do  let  me  press  upon  you  that  standard  books 
must  be  read  before  young  men  are  even  begin- 
ning to  be  in  a  position  to  judge  of  the  value 
of  new  and  starthng  utterances.  There  are  far 
too  many  theological  books  written  just  now,  of 
which  the  guiding  idea  seems  to  be,  that  in  order 
to  be  forcible  you  must  be  startling.  We  have 
views  on  the  Sacraments  strongly  marked  by 
this  characteristic;  views  on  Reformation  his- 
tory, views  on  the  development  of  the  religion 
of  the  future,  and  what  not.  You  may  take  from 
me,  as  one  of  the  results  of  a  hfe  of  much  study 
of  one  sort  or  another,  the  warning  that  there  is  no 
real  power  in  paradox,  and  that  where  a  book  bases 
its  claims  on  startling  revelations,  its  conclusions 
are  apt  to  be  either  very  old  or  very  false. 

"Still,  there  are  abundant  stores  of  good  new 
books  as  well  as  silly  ones;  I  wish  that  my  younger 
clergy  would  read  the  safe  ones  first.  Real 
knowledge,  real  fruitful  knowledge,  can  only  be 
acquired  by  learning  one's  way  through  such 
discipline;  do  not  let  the  element  of  novelty, 


234      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

even  if  the  novelty  be  one  of  the  widest  general 
interest,  and  the  resistance  to  its  temptation 
regarded  as  a  mark  of  backwardness  and  obscur- 
antism —  do  not  let  the  novelty  of  new  theory 
or  the  promising  vistas  of  developing  research 
beguile  you  away  from  the  real  stores  and  foun- 
tains of  knowledge."^ 

Intellectual  indolence  is  the  besetting  sin  of 
the  modern  preacher.  Two  centuries  ago  Bishop 
Burnet  contrasted  the  clergyman  with  the  law- 
yer and  the  physician,  and  asked  indignantly 
whether  "the  noblest  and  most  important"  of 
all  employments  ought  to  be  supposed  to  require 
less  intellectual  effort  than  was  admittedly  in- 
dispensable in  the  professions  of  law  and  medi- 
cine. The  conditions  under  which  the  modern 
preacher  fulfils  his  duty  are,  however,  actually 
unfavourable  to  study.  Indolence  is  at  once 
fostered  and  disguised.  Take  but  the  excessive 
multipHcation  of  sermons.  Preaching  in  the 
true  sense  has  almost  perished  before  the  stream 
of  impromptu  speech.  The  practice  of  speak- 
ing off  the  surface  of  the  mind  is  easily  acquired, 
and  highly  applauded  by  the  rehgious  public, 
which  admires  the  facile  fervour  of  the  popular 
orator  far  more  than  the  disciplined  earnestness 
of  the  studious  divine.  Fuller's  description  of 
the  "faithful  preacher's"  method  has  certainly 
not  lost  relevance: 

^v.  "Visitation  Charges,"  p.  233. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       235 

"He  will  not  offer  to  God  of  that  which  costs 
him  nothing.  ...  But  takes  pains  beforehand 
for  his  sermons.  .  .  .  Indeed,  if  our  minister  be 
surprised  with  a  sudden  occasion,  he  counts  him- 
self rather  to  be  excused  than  commended,  if, 
premeditating  only  the  bones  of  his  sermon,  he 
clothes  it  with  flesh  ex  tempore.  As  for  those 
whose  long  custom  hath  made  preaching  their 
nature,  so  that  they  can  discourse  sermons  with- 
out study,  he  accounts  their  examples  rather  to 
be  admired  than  imitated."^ 

Intellectual  indolence  lies  at  the  root  of  that 
lack  of  sympathy  with  new  ideas  which  com- 
monly marks  the  mass  of  clergymen.  Having 
never  formed  a  genuine  love  of  reading,  and  early 
lost  the  habit  of  it,  they  fall  under  the  dominion 
of  their  own  rhetoric,  and  by  constant  iteration 
confirm  in  their  minds  notions,  which  they  have 
never  seriously  examined,  and  could  not  intelli- 
gently defend.  This  at  least  ought  to  be  ca- 
pable of  remedy.  That  the  majority  of  clergymen 
should  be  intellectually  competent  to  lead  thought 
is  of  course  out  of  the  question;  but  that  every 
preacher  should  know  enough  to  escape  the 
fanatical  temper,  and  to  secure  a  fair  hearing 
for  new  and  unpalatable  opinions,  ought  not  to 
be  beyond  attainment.  So  much  at  least  a 
sound  education  for  the  ministry  and  a  right 
ordering  of  the  preacher's  life  ought  to  secure. 

^v.  "Holy  and  Profane  State,"  p.  75,  London,  1841. 


236      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

The  most  simple  faith  ought  not  to  be  incon- 
sistent with  so  much  tolerance  as  the  Pharisee 
displayed,  when  he  bade  the  Sanhedrin  let  the 
Apostles  alone  in  order  that  God  Himself  might 
disclose  the  quaHty  of  their  teaching  in  experi- 
ence. Instead  of  manufacturing  rehgious  panic, 
and  organizing  the  vague  prejudices  of  unlet- 
tered people  against  individuals,  who,  whatever 
their  errors  and  faults,  are  at  least  sacrificing 
their  worldly  prospects  in  the  service  of  what 
they  believe  to  be  the  truth,  the  preachers  ought 
to  be  within  the  Church  the  grand  security 
against  every  form  of  un- Christian  intolerance. 
We  know,  alas,  that  the  very  converse  has  been 
the  case,  that  Christian  history  is  stained  from 
end  to  end  by  the  fanacticism  of  preachers,  that 
they  have  stood  at  the  head  of  every  panic,  that 
no  excesses  of  popular  bigotry  have  lacked  their 
support. 

I  think  we  grossly  delude  ourselves  if  we  sup- 
pose that  fanaticism  is  a  spent  force;  and  that 
the  Church  of  the  future  wiU  not  continue  the 
tradition  of  religious  intolerance.  On  the  con- 
trary, I  hold  that  the  circumstances  of  the  mod- 
ern Church  are,  in  some  important  respects, 
very  unfavourable  to  religious  liberty.  Some- 
thing has  already  been  said  of  the  baleful  influ- 
ence of  the  rehgious  press,  and  of  the  social 
conditions  which  hamper  the  didactic  work  of 
the  ministry.     Here  we  may  notice  the  peril  to 


THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING      237 

intellectual  liberty  implied  in  the  emotionalism 
of  urban  populations,  and  in  the  application  to 
reHgion  of  notions  borrowed  from  commerce. 
It  is  often  assumed  that  "business  men"  are 
naturally  the  friends  of  liberty,  and,  at  least  in 
England,  popularity  in  a  commercial  centre  is 
supposed  to  be  a  sufficient  certificate  of  rehgious 
tolerance.  The  truth  seems  to  be  that  "business 
men"  are  extremely  hostile  to  every  form  of 
ecclesiastical  discipline  which  affects  their  own 
freedom  of  action,  and  to  that  extent  may  be 
regarded  as  the  friends  of  liberty;  but  they  have 
little  sympathy  with  intellectual  perplexities; 
they  are  ready  to  apply  to  rehgious  questions  the 
prompt  and  decisive  methods  of  the  city;  to  inter- 
pret clerical  subscription  in  simple  terms  of  legal 
contract;  to  make  success  the  criterion  of  spiritual 
efficiency:  and  to  give  Httle  consideration  to  any 
teaching  that  cannot  command  popular  accept- 
ance. Commercial  Christianity  is  apt  to  be ' 
morally  lax,  but  intellectually  rigid;  it  easily 
favours  sensational  preaching  and  aesthetic  ser- 
vices, but  it  has  Httle  concern  with  thought,  and 
is  actually  hostile  to  disciphne.  The  Christian- 
ity of  the  future  will  be  more  and  more  centred 
in  great  cities.  The  Church  will  express  the 
tastes  and  reflect  the  standards  of  business  men. 
"Spiritual  efficiency,"  as  understood  by  success- 
ful city  men,  wiU  be  the  accepted  equivalent  of 
truth;   and   the   Uberty   of  prophesying  wiU  be 


238      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

straitly  conditioned  by  the  prevailing  fashion. 
In  this  situation  I  apprehend  large  possibilities 
of  oppression.  We  shall  not,  indeed,  ever  again 
be  scandalized  by  the  violences  of  persecution; 
but  the  too  independent  preacher  will  be  effectu- 
ally dealt  with  in  other  ways.  Ignored  by  his 
superiors,  boycotted  by  his  professional  brethren, 
and  silently  expelled  from  pubUc  regard,  he  will 
at  no  stage  in  the  process  be  able  to  complain 
of  oppression.  Yet  he  will  be  as  truly  sacrificed 
to  religious  intolerance  as  any  victim  of  the  holy 
office.  He  must  find  such  protection  against 
injustice  as  he  can,  not  in  the  law  which  will 
rarely  be  invoked  against  him,  nor  in  public 
opinion  which  will  regard  him  with  indifference 
or  dislike,  but  in  the  fair  and  tolerant  spirit  of 
his  brethren,  who  at  least  understand  his  situa- 
tion, and  ought  not  to  be  unsympathetic  with 
his  perplexities.  Unless  a  great  change  shall 
pass  over  the  clergy  even  that  protection  will  be 
lacking.  Yet  the  student  of  Christian  history 
recalls  with  veneration  the  names,  few,  indeed, 
but  famous,  of  those  preachers,  who  have  had 
the  manly  courage  to  resist  the  fierce  and  sud- 
den pressure  of  religious  panic,  and  to  lift  their 
voices  in  behalf  of  the  unpopular  and  unfriended 
advocates  of  new  truth.  Who  does  not  honour 
Bishop  Earle  for  opposing  the  persecution  of 
the  Nonconformists  in  the  orgy  of  Anglican  fanati- 
cism   which    followed    the    Restoration?    Who 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       239 

does  not  venerate  Archbishop  Leighton  for 
resisting  the  oppression  of  the  Scottish  Presby- 
terians? Who  does  not  think  the  better  of 
Stanley  for  standing  by  Colenso,  when  the 
stream  of  religious  fanaticism  ran  violently 
against  him?  Who  would  not  rather  have  been 
on  the  side  of  the  persecuted  minority  at  every 
one  of  the  recurrent  panics,  which  throughout 
its  history  have  disgraced  the  Christian  Church? 
I  cannot  pretend  to  be  an  optimist  about  the 
immediate  future.  I  expect  to  see  within  a  few 
years  an  occurrence  of  religious  panic.  In  Eng- 
land certainly,  —  I  cannot  speak  for  America  — • 
the  rank  and  file  of  Christian  people  are  only 
beginning  to  realize  the  changes  which  are  being 
effected  in  thought  by  the  application  of  histor- 
ical and  literary  criticism  to  the  New  Testament; 
and  when  they  understand  what  is  implied  in 
that  theological  reconstruction,  which  is  spoken 
about  with  so  much  confidence  but  with  so  little 
reflection,  they  will  be  vehemently  disturbed. 
Then  the  familiar  situation  will  have  returned. 
There  will  be  a  short  cut  to  popularity  for  any 
able  preacher  who  chooses  to  make  himself  the 
mouthpiece  of  the  popular  fears,  and  the  apolo- 
gist of  the  popular  prejudices:  but  it  will  be  a 
popularity  purchased  by  the  gravest  disloyalty 
to  truth.  I  would  direct  the  minds  of  the  clergy 
—  especially  those  who  are  beginning  their 
ministry  —  to  the  high  obligation  under  which 


240      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

their  office  places  them,  to  take  a  worthier  course, 
to  stand  like  Aaron  between  the  living  and  the 
dead,  and  stay  the  plague  of  fanaticism,  to  insist 
on  the  primary  duties  of  justice  and  considera- 
tion, and  at  all  costs  to  resist  the  tyrannous  pro- 
posals of  panic,  however  excused  by  ignorance, 
masked  by  sincerity,  extenuated  by  practical 
pleas. 

Bishop  Thirwall  —  a  protagonist  of  intel- 
lectual liberty  in  days  when  the  spirit  of  intol- 
erance was  more  outspoken  if  not  more  potent 
than  it  is  now  —  told  his  clergy  that  the  contro- 
versies of  the  time  —  he  was  referring  to  the 
case  of  Bishop  Colenso  —  should  "bring  home 
to  their  minds  the  thought  that  we  have  greater 
need  than  ever  to  distinguish  between  things 
which  do  and  things  which  do  not  concern  our 
Christian  faith  and  hope."  That  surely  is  the 
moral  of  our  present  perplexities.  It  is  of  vital 
importance  to  the  credit  of  Christianity  that  this 
distinction  should  be  made:  it  is  matter  of  deep 
concern  to  multitudes  of  individual  Christians. 
Who  shall  put  hand  to  the  task  by  so  clear  a 
right  as  the  Christian  preacher?  Who  shall 
handle  condemned  doctrines  with  the  same  sym- 
pathy, or  present  unaccustomed  truths  with  the 
same  reverence?  But  if  the  Christian  preacher 
is  indeed  to  fulfil  this  mediatorial  and  directing 
function  in  the  future,  clearly  he  must  have  pre- 
pared himself  for  the  sacred  work  long  before. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       241 

The  crisis  must  not  overtake  him  unprepared, 
or  shake  him  off  his  personal  faith.  How  can 
he  hope  to  speak  wisely  or  helpfully  then,  if  his 
mind  has  not  been  exercised  on  the  subject  now  ? 
In  order  that  he  may  be  able  in  any  measure  to 
serve  the  Church  as  a  "Ductor  Dubitantium" 
in  the  coming  time  of  acute  crisis,  one  condition 
must  be  satisfied.  His  own  intellectual  freedom 
must  be  complete,  and  known  to  be  complete. 
His  "Uberty  of  prophesying"  must  be  as  wide 
as  his  own  discipleship  demands,  because  no 
narrower  limits  will  enable  the  service  which 
another's  discipleship  may  require.  In  these 
high  concerns  of  the  human  spirit,  when  its 
fundamental  loyalties  are  in  question,  and  a  man 
is  confronted  by  the  "to  be  or  not  to  be"  of  relig- 
ion itself,  the  mere  suspicion  of  unreality,  of 
conventional  profession,  of  orthodox  and  pre- 
scribed belief,  is  fatal  to  confidence;  and  by  sure 
consequence  fatal  also  to  all  power  of  service. 

I  have  sometimes  indulged  a  day-dream  of  the 
Christian  preacher  as  he  shall  be  in  the  day  when 
the  churches  shall  have  faith  and  courage  enough 
to  burn,  as  the  Ephesians  their  "  curious  books," 
the  formularies  of  doctrine  and  lists  of  official 
credenda,  and  set  him  in  his  spiritual  birthright 
of  responsible  independence.  I  imagine  him  as 
a  man,  studious  and  sympathetic,  humble  because 
he  knows,  reverent  because  he  believes,  tolerant 
because  he  doubts,   to  whom  his  fellows  turn 


242      THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING 

naturally  in  their  distress  since,  like  the  old 
wise  Cambridge  teacher,  he  so  realizes  their 
situation,  and  understands  their  needs,  that  his 
question  is  ever,  Quid  dubitas?  What  doubts 
have  visited  your  mind  to-day?  assuming,  what 
indeed  experience  shows,  that  to  doubt  nothing 
and  to  understand  nothing  are  the  same;  that 
every  step  forward  in  such  a  world  as  this  must 
mean,  for  a  thinking  and  feeling  man,  not  only 
an  old  question  answered,  but  a  new  question 
raised:  who  says  of  himself,  "With  me  faith 
means  perpetual  unbelief,"  because  in  some 
measure  he  has  been  brought  by  his  pastoral 
sympathy  into  accord  with  His  Mind,  Who 
"  would  feel  all  that  he  might  pity  all." 

One  concluding  word  of  explanation  may 
perhaps  not  be  thought  superfluous.  It  has  not 
fallen  within  the  lines  of  my  subject  to  discuss 
those  aspects  of  the  preacher's  work  which  are 
certainly  more  familiar,  and  might  fairly  be 
thought  more  important.  I  have  taken  comfort 
from  the  circumstance  that  I  stand  in  a  series  of 
lecturers,  all  commissioned  to  treat  of  the  same 
theme.  The  faults  of  any  particular  course  of 
Lyman  Beecher  lectures  may  safely  be  assumed 
to  have  been  corrected  by  some  other.  To 
avoid  the  risk  of  unconscious  plagiarism  I  made 
a  point  of  not  reading  (with  a  single  exception) 
the  work  of  my  predecessors  until  my  own  lec- 
tures had  been  written;  but  as  soon  as  this  was 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       243 

the  case,  I  made  the  acquaintance  of  such  pub- 
lished lectures  as  I  could  conveniently  lay  hands 
on.  I  have  learned  with  alarm  my  defects  as 
a  lecturer,  and  with  reHef  that  those  defects 
have  been  neutralized  in  advance  by  abler  men. 
The  subject  which,  however  faultily,  I  have 
brought  before  you,  is  one  of  obvious  impor- 
tance, which  at  any  time  and  for  any  one  of  you 
may  take  also  the  character  of  urgency.  If  I 
have  induced  any  of  you  to  consider  what  I 
have  called  "the  Liberty  of  Prophesying"  from 
a  somewhat  unaccustomed  point  of  view,  I 
shall  not  wholly  have  failed  of  my  purpose,  or 
abused  your  courtesy  and  patience. 


rx 


DIVINE   VOCATION 


In  the  year  that  King  Uzziah  died  I  saw  the 
Lord  sitting  upon  a  throne,  high  and  lifted  up, 
and  his  train  filled  the  Temple  .  .  .  And  I  heard 
the  voice  of  the  Lord,  saying,  Whom  shall  I  send  ? 
and  who  will  go  for  us  ?  Then  I  said,  Here  am 
I;  send  me.  And  he  said.  Go.  (Isaiah  vi.  i, 
8,9.) 

Nothing  more  provokes  our  curiosity  than  the 
career  of  an  admittedly  great  man.  What  were 
the  original  springs  of  what  we  perforce  describe 
as  his  originahty?  Whence  came  the  enthusi- 
asm which  sustained,  and  the  purpose  which 
directed,  his  amazing  achievements?  Something 
we  can  discover  by  inquiry.  Every  biographer 
now  bestows  much  labour  on  the  family  history 
of  his  hero,  and  records  with  scrupulous  care  the 
conditions  under  which  his  childhood  and  youth 
were  passed.  We  have  gained  the  key  to  much 
when  we  have  ascertained  the  manner  of  his  up- 
bringing, and  the  men  with  whom  in  his  impres- 
sionable early  years  he  was  brought  into  close 
and  continuous  contact.  When  we  have  been 
244 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       245 

told  who  were  the  parents,  the  teachers,  and  the 
friends  of  a  man,  we  may  make  a  theory  as  to 
him  wliich  will  very  probably  be  justified   by 
the  facts  of  his  career.     The  higher  the  type  of 
greatness,  however,  the  less  trustworthy  will  these 
instruments  of   explanation   be   found.     Genius 
has  no  family  history,  and  leaves  no  heirs  to  its 
greatness.     Something,  of  course,  must,  even  in 
the  case  of  men  of  genius,  be  allowed  to  heredity, 
and  circumstance,   and   personal  influence,   but 
that  which  is  characteristic,  and  gives  them  their 
supreme  place  in  the  annals  of  mankind,  will,  in 
the  case  of  the  greatest  of  men,  be  incapable  of 
explanation   from   these   sources.     Most   of   all, 
for  they  are  at  the  summit  of  human  greatness, 
will  such  sources  fail  us,  when  we  try  to  under- 
stand the  process,  by  which  the  religious  leaders 
of  the  race  have  been  brought  to  their  subHme 
work.     Then  we  are  confronted  by  a  phenomenon 
which  no  terrestrial  factors  can  suffice  to  explain, 
and  no  industry  of  anxious  and  keen-sighted  in- 
quirers can  avail  to  interpret.     We  are  perforce 
driven   to   the   conclusion    that    another    Power 
than  that  which  is  calculable  and  well  ascertained 
has  been  present,  a  Creative  and  Inspiring  Power 
from  on  High,  fashioning  the  human  material 
for  more  than  human  possibiHties,  and  binding  a 
passing  Hfe-story  of  man  into  the  very  woof  and 
texture  of  Divine  Purpose.     "  The  wind  hloweth 
where  it  listeth,  and  thou  hearest  the  voice  thereof, 


246      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

bui  knowest  not  whence  it  cometh,  and  whither  U 
goeth:   so  is  every  one  that  is  born  of  the  spirit y 

In  the  sixth  chapter  of  Isaiah  we  have  the  ex- 
planation offered  by  the  greatest  of  the  "goodly 
fellowship  of  the  prophets"  for  his  own  career. 
Critical  scholars  have  discussed  the  question, 
whether  the  experience  described  by  Isaiah 
ought  properly  to  stand  at  the  beginning  of  his 
prophecy,  or  whether  its  true  position  is  repre- 
sented by  the  place  it  holds  in  the  collected  prophe- 
cies. We  can  hardly  be  uncertain  as  to  the  main 
issue,  whatever  may  be  our  verdict  on  the  Hterary 
questions.  An  experience  of  the  nature  here 
described  can  only  come  at  the  start  of  a  prophet's 
ministry,  although  he  may  not  understand  its 
full  gravity  until  he  recalls  it  after  an  interval 
of  years.  The  narrative  tells  "the  spiritual 
process  which  the  prophet  actually  passed  through 
before  the  opening  of  his  ministry,"  but  it  gives 
us  that  process  "developed  by  subsequent  ex- 
perience, and  presented  to  us  in  the  language  of 
outward  vision."^ 

True  indeed  it  is  that  human  purpose  never 
has  so  definite  and  intelligible  an  aspect  as  when 
it  flashes  first  in  sudden  intuition  on  the  mind. 
The  main  end  fills  the  vision;  the  essential 
significance  absorbs  the  attention;  all  the  thou- 
sand contingencies  which  will  obscure  that  end 
and  compromise  that  significance  are  as  yet 
^v.  G.  A.  Smith,  "Isaiah,"  I,  p.  58. 


THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       247 

unsuspected.  Everything  is  clear,  clear-cut,  and 
coercive.  But  with  the  years  comes  also  a  cleansing 
of  the  spiritual  vision;  and  the  intuitions  of  youth, 
seen  in  the  retrospect,  are  seen  more  justly.  The 
correspondence  of  the  earlier  and  the  later  visions 
brings  the  verification  of  their  quality.  If  the 
man,  wise  with  the  bitter  wisdom  of  failure  and 
conflict,  hears  still  the  Voice  which  thrilled  the 
unshadowed  heart  of  the  boy,  that  Voice  needs 
no  better  authentication  of  origin.  For  inspira- 
tion or  for  the  "great  refusal"  then,  for  acquittal 
or  for  condemnation  now,  it  was,  and  is,  the 
Voice  of  God.  All  the  years  are  bound  by  it 
into  a  single  experience. 

I  hear  a  voice,  perchance  I  heard 

Long  ago,  but  all  too  low, 

So  that  scarce  a  care  it  stirred 

If  the  voice  were  real  or  no; 

I  heard  it  in  my  youth  when  first 

The  waters  of  my  life  outburst; 

But,  now  their  stream  ebbs  faint,  I  hear 

That  voice,  still  low,  but  fatal  clear. 

There  is  the  ring  of  reminiscence  about  the 
precise  statement  as  to  the  date  of  the  vision: 
"/w  the  year  that  King  Uzziah  died,  I  saw  the 
Lord:' 

The  narrative  of  Isaiah's  vocation,  then, 
carries  the  deliberate  affirmation  of  a  judgment 
trained  and  tested  by  long  experience.  We  have 
in  it  neither  the  extravagance  of  rhapsody,  nor 


248       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

the  license  of  rhetoric.  The  prophet  is  not  in 
extasy,  or  in  the  act  of  pubHc  oratory.  To  some 
disciple  he  dictates  with  calm  conviction  the  story 
of  the  origin  of  his  astonishing  career.  He  had 
received  a  "call"  from  God;  he  was  to  his  con- 
temporaries a  Divinely-commissioned  man:  he 
carried  a  message  which  at  all  hazards  he  must 
deUver;  everything  about  him  presupposed  this 
primary  and  persisting  character.  For  good  or 
for  ill  his  countrymen  must  make  their  count  with 
him  as  an  inspired  person,  the  messenger  of  the 
Lord  of  Hosts.  Herein,  of  course,  Isaiah  was 
thoroughly  representative  of  his  class.  "The 
prophets  do  not  speak  of  a  resolution  or  purpose, 
framed  by  themselves:  but  they  describe  a 
moment  in  which  they  received  a  call  — «.g.,  to 
speak  from  a  human  point  of  view,  were  con- 
scious of  a  sudden  intuition,  impressing  itself 
upon  them  with  irresistible  clearness  and  force, 
and,  in  certain  instances,  communicated  to  them 
in  the  form  of  a  vision."  ^ 

We  may  take  the  narrative,  then,  as  the  prophet 
certainly  designed  it  to  be  taken,  as  the  best  ac- 
count he  had  it  in  his  power  to  give  of  the  life 
which  he  was  leading,  a  life  which  wonderfully 
impressed  his  contemporaries,  and  which  im- 
presses us,  perhaps,  even  more  wonderfully  after 
an  interval  of  more  than  twenty-six  centuries. 
In  the  text  we  have  combined  the  two  essential 
^v.  Driver,  "Isaiah,"  p.  i6. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       249 

features  of  prophetic  vocation.  First  of  all,  there 
is  the  vision  of  God,  clear,  fixed  in  the  memory 
as  having  happened  at  a  precise  moment,  bound 
up  with  the  distinctive  circumstances  of  the 
prophet's  life:  ''In  the  year  that  King  Uzziah 
died  I  saw  the  Lord  sitting  upon  a  throne, 
high  and  lifted  up,  and  his  train  filled  the 
Temple.''^ 

The  death  of  King  Uzziah  closed  a  career  of 
mingled  glory  and  ignominy,  which  burned  itself 
deeply  into  the  mind  of  the  nation.  At  the  end 
of  his  long  reign  he  had  been  stricken  with  the 
loathsome  plague  of  leprosy,  and  had  perished 
in  seclusion.  The  "Chronicler,"  who  may  be 
assumed  to  express  the  feelings  of  the  religious 
class  from  which  the  prophets  were  drawn,  con- 
nects the  king's  leprosy  with  his  presumption  in 
attempting  to  burn  incense  upon  the  altar  of 
incense,  and,  though  the  historic  value  of  the 
Chronicles  is  not  great,  yet  there  seems  some 
reason  for  thinking  that  this  narrative  at  least 
enshrines  a  true  tradition.  If  this  be  the  case, 
and  the  king's  calamity  was  at  the  time  generally 
believed  to  be  a  punishment  of  God  for  his  ritual 
uncleanness,  we  can  understand  how  the  first 
thought,  which  would  be  suggested  to  Isaiah's 
mind  by  the  vision  of  Jehovah,  would  be  that  of 
his  own  unfitness  for  the  Divine  Presence.  "  Then 
said  I,  woe  is  me!  for  I  am  undone:  because  I  am 
a  man  of  unclean  lips:  for  mine  eyes  have  seen 


250      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

the  king,  the  Lord  of  Hosts."  It  is  indeed  of  no 
merely  ceremonial  defilement  that  he  is  thinking. 
His  vision  of  God  is  the  true  prophetic  vision  of 
the  supremely  righteous  Being  —  the  Holy  One 
of  Israel  —  Whose  Will  is  made  known  to  men 
in  the  monitions  of  conscience.  He  could  not 
have  been  ignorant  of  that  deep  and  luminous 
oracle  which  has  come  down  to  us  in  the  pages 
of  his  younger  contemporary,  Micah,  and  which 
remains  the  summary  of  true  prophecy  still: 
"He  (i.e.,  the  Lord)  hath  shewed  thee,  O  man, 
what  is  good;  and  what  doth  the  Lord  require  of  thee, 
hut  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy,  and  to  walk 
humbly  with  thy  God."  It  is  the  deeper  conception 
of  uncleanness,  as  not  physical  but  moral,  that 
compels  the  thought  that  purification,  if  indeed 
it  is  to  be  effectual,  must  be  a  Divine  Act.  Isaiah's 
mind  might  have  been  uttered  in  the  words  of  the 
prophet,  HosEA,  who  about  this  very  time  had 
been  called  to  his  ministry  in  the  northern 
kingdom.  "Come  and  let  us  return  unto  the 
Lord:  for  he  hath  torn,  and  he  will  heal  us;  he 
hath  smitten,  and  He  will  hind  us  up."  The 
corruption  in  the  nation,  and,  as  the  prophet 
sadly  felt,  the  corruption  in  himself,  were  beyond 
the  remedy  of  any  lesser  power.  The  imposing 
system  of  estabHshed  rehgion  was  helpless  here: 
all  the  elaborate  and  detailed  ritual  purifications 
prescribed  by  official  authority  were  futile  in 
that    Presence.     God    Himself    must    cleanse, 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       251 

The  Christian  hymn  utters  the  very  thought  of 
the  prophet: 

Not  the  labours  of  my  hands 
Can  fulfil  Thy  law's  demands; 
Could  my  zeal  no  respite  know, 
Could  my  tears  for  ever  flow, 
All  for  sin  could  not  atone; 
Thou  must  save,  and  Thou  alone. 

''God  resisteth  the  proud,  and  giveth  grace  to  the 
humble."  The  Divine  Purification  v^hich  the 
prophet  longs  for  is  not  refused:  ''Then  flew 
one  of  the  Seraphim  unto  me,  having  a  live 
coal  in  his  hand,  which  he  had  taken  with  the 
tongs  from  off  tJie  altar:  and  he  touched  my 
mouth  with  it,  and  said,  Lo,  this  hath  touched  thy 
lips:  and  thine  iniquity  is  taken  away,  and  thy 
sin  purged'^  Thus  Isaiah  is  made  ready  for  his 
work.  To  the  Hstening  ear  of  the  "  expectant,"  on 
whom  the  absolving  touch  has  passed,  is  audible 
the  Voice  of  Jehovah  speaking  the  words  of 
prophetic  vocation,  "/  heard  the  voice  of  the  Lord, 
saying,  whom  shall  I  send,  and  who  will  go  for  us  ? 
Then  I  said.  Here  am  I;  send  me."  This  is  the 
abiding  impression  left  on  his  mind  by  that 
spiritual  crisis  of  his  youth;  this  is  the  interpreta- 
tion which  experience  permits,  nay  compels,  him 
to  pass  on  that  moment  of  spiritual  exaltation. 
It  gave  him  a  direction,  which  he  could  not  but 
recognize  and  obey;  it  burned  into  his  soul  a  con- 
viction, which  nothing  could  ever  efface.     The 


252       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

directness  and  simplicity  of  this  Divine  Call  are 
indeed  impressive:  "Whom  shall  I  send?  and 
who  will  go  for  us?"  The  words  have  carried  to 
Christian  ears  a  doctrinal  suggestion,  which, 
however,  they  did  not  originally  bear.  "  Tfie 
Lord  of  Hosts"  is  thought  of  by  the  Jewish 
prophets  as  holding  His  heavenly  court,  and 
addressing  His  assembled  courtiers.  So  in 
Micaiah's  vision  of  the  destruction  of  Ahab. 
"7  saw  the  Lord"  —  says  the  prophet  —  "Sitting 
on  his  throne,  and  all  the  host  of  heaven  standing 
hy  him  on  his  right  hand,  and  on  his  left." 
It  is  precisely  such  a  scene  that  is  presented 
in  Isaiah's  vision.  "The  plural  —  Us  —  is  no 
doubt  used  with  reference  to  the  Seraphim,  who 
formed,  together  with  the  Lord,  one  deliberate 
council." ' 

Polytheistic  phraseology  dies  hard:  and  we 
may  not  credit  even  the  "Evangelical  Prophet" 
with  the  spiritual  Theism  which  the  Church 
professes,  and,  we  must  add,  finds  it  so  difficult 
to  maintain  in  purity.  Yet,  perhaps,  it  is  no 
extravagant  proceeding  to  which  we  are  invited, 
when  we  are  bidden  to  read  the  Vision  of  Isaiah 
as  the  special  lesson  on  Trinity  Sunday.  What 
but  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  in  Unity  is  the 
true  theological  basis  of  that  belief  in  Divine 
Mission,  which  is  paramount  in  Isaiah's  record 
of  his  own  vocation?     Every  partial  revelation 

^v.  Delitzsch,  "Isaiah,"  I,  198. 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       253 

ministered  through  prophets  was  a  pledge  of  the 
perfect  revelation  in  and  through  the  Incarnate 
Son:  and,  therefore,  without  doing  any  violence 
to  historic  truth,  we  may  recognize  the  essential 
idea  of  the  Trinitarian  theology  in  that  prophetic 
conception  of  God,  which  represents  Him  as  in 
communication  with  men  through  men.  Nor  is 
it  unreasonable  to  go  with  Delitzsch  yet  one  step 
farther,  and  to  perceive  in  the  implied  solidarity 
of  God  and  the  Seraphim  in  spiritual  purpose  and 
activity  an  idea  which  is  apparently  and  richly 
Christian, 

"  We  must  work  the  works  of  him  that  sent  iwe" 
is  a  deep  utterance  of  the  Christ  as  presented 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel;  and  many  words  of  the 
Saviour  might  be  cited  to  show  that,  in  His 
great  enterprise  of  Redemption,  He  associated 
Himself  with  the  blessed  hierarchies  of  the  spirit- 
ual world,  and  not  less  closely,  nay,  indeed  by 
the  grace  of  the  Incarnation,  far  more  closely, 
with  His  disciples. 

The  Syriac  Fathers  are  said  to  have  regarded 
the  burning  coal  as  the  symbol  of  the  Incarnate 
Son  of  God;  and  we  may  well  see  a  profound 
fitness  in  the  symbolism.  The  burning  coal  in 
Isaiah's  vision  purged  away  his  disabling  un- 
cleanness,  and  inspired  him  with  the  will  and  the 
power  to  obey  the  Call  of  God.  This  twofold 
grace  of  purification  and  inspiration  is  the  gift  of 
the  Incarnate  Son  to  His  brethren.    The  Gospel 


254       THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

indeed  includes  a  narrative  which  might  seem 
the  Christian  counterpart  of  Isaiah's  record  of 
vocation.  The  revelation  of  God  to  an  Apostle 
is  realized  through  the  same  cycle  of  spiritual 
experiences.  First,  conviction  of  sin;  then,  con- 
sciousness of  pardon;  finally,  a  clear  commission. 
Simon  Peter,  when  he  saw  the  sign  which  dis- 
covered the  Presence  of  the  Incarnate,  "fell 
down  at  Jesus^  knees,  saying,  Depart  from  me; 
for  I  am  a  sinful  man,  O  Lord  .  .  .  and  Jesus  said 
unto  Simon,  Fear  not;  from  henceforth  thou  shall 
catch  men.^^ 

We  may  not  forget  that  even  while  we  worship 
here  this  morning,  the  conviction  of  Divine  Voca- 
tion is  being  confessed  by  many  young  men  in 
our  Church.  In  many  a  cathedral  to-day  the 
Bishop  asks  the  momentous  question  of  those 
whom  he  is  about  to  ordain  to  the  Christian 
ministry:  "Do  you  trust  that  you  are  inwardly 
moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost  to  take  upon  you  this 
Office  and  Ministration,  to  serve  God  for  the 
promoting  of  His  glory,  and  the  edifying  of  His 
people?"  Hundreds  of  young  men  will  answer 
publicly  in  the  hearing  of  Christian  congrega- 
tions that  they  do  so  trust.  Perhaps  it  may 
appear  to  some  of  us  a  doubtful,  and  even  an 
extravagant  and  indefensible,  proceeding  on  my 
part  to  bring  into  connection  the  vocation  of  a 
great  prophet  and  the  ordination  of  a  modern 
clergyman;  and  yet,  however  surprising  this  may 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       255 

at  first  sight  appear,  it  is  precisely  what  is  done 
by  the  Bishop  in  the  Ordination  Service,  when 
he  tells  the  young  men  whom  he  is  about  to  ordain 
that  they  are  called  to  be  "Messengers,  Watch- 
men, and  Stewards  of  the  Lord."  Assuredly 
nothing  less  than  a  Divine  Vocation  could  really 
justify  any  man  in  assuming  those  characters, 
and  nothing  less  than  Divine  Grace  could  make 
any  man  equal  to  sustain  them.  ^^  Let  a  man  so 
account  of  us,^^  writes  the  Christian  Apostle,  '^as 
of  ministers  of  Christ,  and  stewards  of  the  mys- 
teries of  Gody  There  is  a  long  step  we  must 
needs  confess  between  this  exalted  language  and 
the  humble  theories  of  the  clerical  office  which 
are  current  among  us;  indeed,  with  the  best  will 
in  the  world,  we  find  it  wonderfully  difficult  to  give 
any  coherent  and  sufficient  meaning  to  the  words 
of  the  Ordinal.  Set  the  sublime  vision  of  Isaiah 
beside  the  decorous  pageantry  of  a  modern  Or- 
dination, and  the  contrast  is  not  so  sharp  as  that 
between  the  theory  of  the  Christian  ministry 
impUed  in  Ordination,  and  that  which  deter- 
mines the  common  practice.  Even  the  guides 
of  the  clergy  adopt  a  mode  of  speech  about 
vocations  which  is  disconcertingly  prosaic  and 
matter-of-fact.  Here  is  an  example  taken  from 
a  " Pan- Anglican  Paper"  on  "Vocation  and 
recruiting  of  candidates  for  Holy  Orders"  by 
the  Rev.  H.  H.  Kelly,  Director  of  the  Society 
of  the  Sacred  Mission: 


256      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

"It  is  admitted  by  ail  tliat  a  vast  number  of 
tliose  who  are  certain  of  tiieir  own  vocation  are 
quite  unfit,  and  tliat  we  must  tiierefore  'test' 
vocations.  How  can  ive  test  God's  Spirit?  Of 
course  we  must  recognize  God's  action,  but  tliat 
action  —  vocation  —  is  not  limited  to  ecclesiasti- 
cal matters.  When  the  government  by  exami- 
nation chooses  an  officer,  that  choice  is  God's 
calling  to  the  lad,  given  by  the  authority  He  has 
appointed,  and  those  who  are  unsuccessful  can- 
not plead  a  direct  'vocation'  independent  of  the 
government.  We  want  to  enlist  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  Church  as  a  whole,  but  the  moment  we 
begin  counting  vocations,  we  are  dealing  not  with 
wholes,  but  with  separated  individuals." 

If  I  understand  him  rightly,  he  would  evacuate 
the  solemn  question  of  the  Ordaining  Bishop  of 
its  searching  personal  reference,  and  encourage 
the  candidate  for  Ordination  to  repose  his  entire 
confidence  of  Divine  Vocation  in  the  formal  act 
of  Ordination.  What  a  fall  from  the  old  prophetic 
doctrine  is  here  involved! 

The  clergyman's  consciousness  of  personal 
inadequacy  will  unite  witli  the  laymen's  reluctance 
to  recognize  the  reality  of  Divine  Action  in  lower- 
ing his  theory  of  his  ministry.  As  a  priest, 
of  course,  he  will  be  intelligible  enough;  all  the 
indigenous  superstition  of  mankind  applauds  and 
admits  that  character.  As  a  professional  man 
he  will  fall  under  a  familiar  and  well-understood 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING    257 

description.  As  a  partisan  he  will  be  sufficiently 
welcome;  for  men  will  interpret  his  behaviour  as 
they  interpret  their  own  in  the  same  category  of 
partisanship.  To  admit,  however,  a  different 
and  a  higher  character  than  any  of  these,  to 
acknowledge  the  clergyman's  right  to  approach 
them  in  the  old  prophetic  spirit,  "iw  the  name  of 
the  Lord^''  runs  counter  to  all  their  natural 
prejudices.  Here,  where  the  ultimate  validity  of 
our  whole  ministry  is  at  stake,  we  are  unintel- 
ligible. And  from  this  fact  there  passes  upon  us 
a  silent,  subtle,  sustained  influence  of  degradation. 
We  tend  to  sink  to  the  level  on  which  we  are 
known,  understood,  and  described.  Vv'e  acquiesce 
in  being  priests,  or  professional  men,  or  partisans; 
and  the  great  affirmation  with  which  our  ministry 
made  its  start  dies  away  from  memory,  or  only 
lingers  in  our  thought  as  a  distant  and  mocking 
legend.  Men  speak  much  of  the  decUne  in  the 
number  of  Ordination  candidates:  to  my  think- 
ing, the  explanation  lies  on  the  surface  of  our 
modern  hfe.  The  world  is  ceasing  to  require 
priests:  there  are  more  attractive  professions: 
men  weary  of  partisans.  So  long  as  these  are  the 
pubhc  and  prevailing  aspects  of  the  Christian 
ministry,  it  will  be  equally  intelligible  and  despised. 
Yet  never  before  did  men  desire  so  earnestly  the 
presence  in  their  midst  of  the  genuine  prophet 
of  the  Lord,  Upon  our  generation  it  would  seem 
that   the  words  of  Amos   are  being  verified: 


258      THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

"Behold,  the  days  come,  saith  the  Lord  God, 
that  I  ■will  send  a  famine  in  the  land,  not  a  famine 
of  bread,  nor  a  thirst  for  water,  hut  of  Jiearing  the 
words  of  the  Lord.  And  they  shall  wander  from 
sea  to  sea,  and  from  the  north  even  unto  the  east; 
they  shall  rim  to  and  fro  to  seek  the  word  of  the 
Lord,  and  shall  not  find  it.''^ 

Divine  Vocation  must  still  mean  essentially 
what  the  prophet's  vision  disclosed.  The  same 
cycle  of  spiritual  experiences  must  stiU  be  trav- 
ersed by  the  man  who  can  face  his  fellows  with 
the  tremendous  message.  "  Thus  saith  the  Lord.^' 
First,  the  vision  which  creates  personal  con- 
viction— "/  saw  the  Lord'^  —  and  then  the 
crushing  sense  of  personal  sin  —  "  Woe  is  me, 
for  I  am  undone:  because  I  am  a  man  of  unclean 
lips'':  and  then  the  absolving  touch  of  Divine 
Forgiveness,  and  in  the  still  sweetness  of  that 
Peace  with  God,  His  call,  clear,  audible,  coercive. 
"/  heard  the  voice  of  the  Lord,  saying.  Whom 
shall  I  send,  and  who  will  go  for  us?"  And  the 
answer  of  obedient  faith  —  "Here  am  I,  send  me." 
Finally,  the  Divine  Commission,  decisive  yet 
vague,  intelligible  yet  unexplained,  all-demanding 
yet  all-concealing,  an  irrevocable  edict  and  an 
undisclosed  fate:  "And  he  said.  Go."  Isaiah 
tells  the  secret  history  of  every  true  ministry  while 
the  world  stands. 

Forgive  me,  if  I  have  been  driven  by  the  memo- 
ries  and   associations   of   this  day  to  preach  to 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       259 

myself  rather  than  to  you.  Forgive  me,  and  add 
your  prayers  that  in  us  who  must  bear  this  min- 
istry among  you,  and  in  those  younger  men,  who 
have  this  day  confessed  the  same  vocation,  the 
Call  of  God  may  never  wholly  die  away.  In 
failure  and  desertion,  in  the  depression  of  defeat, 
in  the  delusion  of  "success,"  in  the  darkest  hour 
of  fear  and  fault,  let  not  that  Voice  and  Presence 
fail  us! 


X 


AUTHORITY   IN  RELIGION 


They  said  unto  him,  By  what  authority  doest 
thou  these  things  ?  or  who  gave  thee  this  authority 
to  do  these  things  ?     (S.  Mark  xi.  28.) 

The  contemporaries  of  Christ  were  greatly 
impressed  by  the  authority  with  which  He  taught. 
At  the  close  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  we  have 
this  note  of  the  evangelist :  "  //  came  to  pass  when 
Jesus  ended  these  words,  the  multitudes  were  as- 
tonished at  his  teaching:  for  he  taught  them  as 
one  having  authority,  and  not  as  tlieir  scribes." 
What  amazed  the  people  dismayed  and  enraged 
the  official  teachers.  While  Christ  "  taught  with 
authority,"  they  themselves  perforce  taught  by 
authorities,  a  very  different  thing.  He  was 
original :  they  were  professional.  The  credentials 
of  His  teaching  were  in  the  minds  of  men,  which 
involuntarily  owned  its  truth:  the  credentials  of 
their  teaching  were  set  forth  in  legal  form  in  their 
''letters  of  orders,"  and  painfully  shown  by  a 
catena  of  references  to  authoritative  rabbis.  So 
long  as  Christ  Hmited  Himself  to  teaching,  they 
stood  aside  and  watched  Him  in  the  temper  of 
260 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING      261 

deepening  malevolence:  but  when  He  passed 
from  word  to  action,  they  felt  themselves  driven 
to  take  action  also.  On  the  preceding  day, 
Monday  in  Holy  Week  as  we  now  reckon,  Christ 
had  taken  action  of  dramatic  and  formidable 
suggest! veness.  ''He  entered  into  the  temple,  and 
began  to  cast  out  them  that  sold  and  them  that 
bought  in  the  temple,  and  overthrew  the  tables  of  the 
money  changers,  and  the  seats  of  them  that  sold  the 
doves;  and  he  would  not  suffer  that  any  man  should 
carry  a  vessel  through  the  temple." 

We  do  not  perceive  the  full  significance  of 
this  conduct  until  we  remember  that  the  temple 
market  was  part,  perhaps  an  indispensable  part, 
of  the  organization  of  the  temple  worship,  and 
that  that  worship  was  the  core  of  the  whole 
system  of  Jewish  religion.  To  break  up  the 
market  was  all  one  with  saying  that  the  pur- 
poses which  the  market  existed  to  serve  were 
no  longer  valid.  That  elaborate  provision  for 
sacrifices  to  be  offered  by  hereditary  and  puri- 
fied worshippers;  that  convenient  system  of 
exchange  by  which  the  various  coinage  of  many 
lands  could  be  transformed  into  the  single  cur- 
rency of  the  temple  tribute;  that  complicated 
organization  of  sacred  business  which  at  once 
justified  and  enriched  the  official  hierarchy  — 
all  were  smitten  when  Christ,  by  an  extreme 
and  amazing  exercise  of  personal  authority, 
broke  up  the  temple  market.     But  He  had  not 


262      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

left  men  to  draw  the  inferences  for  themselves; 
He  had  pointed  the  moral  of  His  action  by 
significant  words.  '^He  taught  and  said  unto 
them,  Is  it  not  written,  My  house  shall  be  called  a 
house  of  prayer  for  all  nations?  but  ye  have  made 
it  a  den  of  robbers.''^  Here  at  once  are  combined 
supreme  personal  claim,  and  direct  appeal  to 
the  human  conscience.  Here  in  a  sentence  is 
legalism  disallowed  and  the  rehgion  of  the  spirit 
proclaimed.  Here  the  middle  wall  of  partition 
between  Jew  and  Gentile  is  pulled  down,  and  an 
unimpeded  access  of  men  to  God  is  shown.  We 
cannot  wonder  that  the  exponents  and  bene- 
ficiaries of  the  system  of  religious  privilege  should 
have  been  deeply  moved,  or  that  the  general 
multitude,  on  whom  their  yoke  had  been  heavy, 
should  have  welcomed  Christ's  speech.  "  The 
chief  priests  and  the  scribes  heard  it,  and  sought 
how  they  might  destroy  him:  for  they  feared 
him,  for  all  the  multitude  was  astonished  at  his 
teaching.''^ 

These  proceedings  on  the  Monday  explain 
the  events  of  the  Tuesday  in  Holy  Week. 
That  Tuesday  was  "Christ's  last  working  day," 
and  from  morning  tiU  nightfall  it  was  crowded 
with  stirring  occurrences.  We  may  fairly  con- 
jecture that  the  authorities  had  met  in  conference 
on  Monday  evening,  and  arranged  their  course  of 
action  for  the  morrow.  As  soon,  therefore,  on 
Tuesday  morning  as  Christ  has  reentered  the 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING     263 

temple  courts,  and  resumed  His  teaching,  He 
is  encountered  by  a  deputation  from  the  Sanhe- 
drin.  "As  he  was  walking  iji  the  temple,  there 
come  to  him  the  chief  priests,  and  the  scribes,  and 
the  elder s^^  —  a  deputation  including  representa- 
tives of  every  section  of  the  Sanhedrin  —  "And 
they  said  unto  him,  By  what  authority  doest  thou 
these  things  ?  or  who  gave  thee  this  authority  to 
do  these  things?''  As  Christ  and  the  deputa- 
tion from  the  Sanhedrin  face  each  other,  tvi^o 
kinds  of  authority  are  contrasted;  on  the  one 
hand  Moral  Authority,  on  the  other  Ecclesiastical 
Authority  which  has  ceased  to  be  moral . 

Ideally  there  should  be  no  contrast  between  the 
ecclesiastical  and  the  moral;  at  every  point  of  its 
ofiEicial  claim  the  ecclesiastical  system  should  be  the 
organ  and  ally  of  morality;  ideally  the  prophet  and 
the  priest  should  be  coworkers  in  the  service  of 
the  same  Divine  Purpose.  In  fact,  however,  it 
has  been  otherwise.  Almost  always  the  ecclesias- 
tical system  fails  to  secure  the  sanction  of  the 
conscience;  the  moral  progress  of  men  outpaces 
the  formal  teaching  of  their  churches,  and,  by  a 
dismaying  and  persistent  paradox,  the  moral 
standard  of  the  priesthood  falls  below  that  of  the 
community  of  believers.  There  are  secular  paral- 
lels to  be  found  which  may  relieve  the  painfulness 
of  the  paradox.  The  antithesis  between  Law  and 
Liberty  is  as  unnatural  as  that  between  an  official 
Church  and  Morality:   but  in  the  experience  of 


264      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

men  it  is  no  less  familiar.  Every  despotism 
which  has  cursed  mankind  is  but  the  depraved 
version  of  government,  without  which  human  life 
in  any  worthy  sense  may  not  proceed.  In  the 
history  of  reUgion  the  prophet  and  the  priest  have 
commonly  been  opponents. 

These  historical  contrasts  are  expressed  and  in- 
terpreted, when  the  All  Holy  Jesus  is  challenged 
by  the  hierarchs  of  Israel  with  a  demand  to  pro- 
duce His  authority.  They  were  certainly  within 
their  legal  rights;  they  were  but  performing  their 
ofhcial  duty  when  thus  they  required  from  Him  an 
answer  to  the  question:  ''By  what  authority  doest 
thou  these  things  ?  or  who  gave  thee  this  authority 
to  do  these  things?''^  We  shall  miss  the  full  sig- 
nificance of  this  history  unless  we  recognize  how 
completely  reasonable  from  their  own  point  of 
view  this  question  was.  "They  were  not  there 
to  oppose  Him;  but,  when  a  man  did  as  He  had 
done  in  the  temple,  it  was  their  duty  to  verify 
his  credentials."  There  appears  to  have  been 
a  very  careful  discipHne  of  ordination  among  the 
Jews  which  curiously  resembles  that  of  the  Chris- 
tian Church.  The  presence  of  at  least  three 
ordained  persons  was  required  for  ordination; 
the  ceremony  included  the  laying  on  of  hands 
and  the  use  of  a  regular  form  of  words.  "The 
title  'Rabbi'  was  formally  bestowed  on  the  candi- 
date, and  authority  given  him  to  teach  and  to  act 
as  judge  (to  bind  and  loose,  to  declare  guilty  or 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING        265 

free).  Nay,  there  seem  to  have  been  even  differ- 
ent orders,  according  to  the  authority  bestowed 
on  the  person  ordained.  The  formula  in  be- 
stowing full  orders  was  '  Let  him  teach;  let  him 
teach;  let  him  judge;  let  him  decide  on  questions 
of  first-horn;  let  him  decide;  let  him  judge ! '  At 
one  time  it  was  held  that  ordination  could 
only  take  place  in  the  Holy  Land.  Those  who 
went  abroad  took  with  them  their  'letters  of 
orders.'"^ 

Christ's  counter-question  impHes  the  admis- 
sion that  He  had  no  " letters  of  orders"  to  produce, 
but  it  also  impUes  the  claim  to  another  and  a  higher 
ministry  than  that  to  which  formal  ordination 
admitted,  a  kind  of  ministry,  moreover,  which  the 
professed  students  of  the  Scriptures  ought  not 
to  have  forgotten,  and  which  indeed  had  been 
recently  reproduced  in  their  midst,  "Jesus  said 
unto  them,  I  will  ask  of  you  one  question,  and 
answer  me,  and  I  will  tell  you  by  what  authority  I 
do  these  things.  The  baptism  of  John,  was  it  from 
heaven,  or  from  men  ?  answer  me.'"  This  ques- 
tion was  no  mere  evasion,  still  less  an  adroit 
irrelevance,  designed  to  embarrass  the  hierarchy. 
It  carried  to  the  heart  of  the  issue  of  authority, 
and  gave  a  clear  answer  to  their  question.  For 
not  only  had  the  Baptist  fulfilled  a  prophetic 
ministry  of  the  recognized  type,  but  he  had  also 
borne  public  and  repeated  witness  to  the  superior 
^v.  Edersheim,  "Life  and  Times,"  vol.  II,  382. 


266      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

ministry  of  Jesus,  to  Whom  he  had  represented 
himself  as  standing  in  the  relation  of  forerunner. 
To  own  that  John's  ministry  was  "from  heaven^^ 
was  by  inevitable  logic  to  own  also  that  the  author- 
ity of  Jesus  was  Divine  and  ample.  The  Lord's 
questioners  indeed  do  not  appear  to  have  seen 
beyond  the  immediate  embarrassment  into  which 
the  question  brought  them.  "  They  reasoned  with 
themselves,  saying,  If  we  shall  say,  From  Heaven; 
he  will  say,  Why  then  did  ye  not  believe  him? 
But  should  we  say.  From  men  —  they  feared  the 
people:  for  all  verily  held  John  to  be  a  propJiet.^' 
Thus  they  floundered  in  the  mire  of  a  sinful 
expediency,  and  were  stricken  dumb  by  their  own 
selfish  fears.  They  who  had  come  to  Jesus  as 
representatives  of  established  authority,  fulfilling 
the  highest  function  of  religious  leaders  by  exam- 
ining and  adjudging  the  claim  to  teach,  find  them- 
selves by  their  own  calculated  silence  reduced  to 
the  miserable  necessity  of  owning  themselves 
incompetent  for  the  very  character  they  had 
thus  publicly  and  solemnly  claimed.  They  had 
indeed  answered  their  own  question  when  they 
declared  that  they  could  not  answer  Christ's. 
"  They  answered  Jesus  and  say.  We  know  not. 
And  Jesus  said  unto  them.  Neither  tell  I  you  by 
what  authority  I  do  these  things."  By  what  title 
could  they  claim  to  pass  judgment  on  Christ's 
right  to  teach,  when  they  perforce  acknowledged 
that  they  were  unable  to  determine  the  lesser 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       267 

point  of  John's  authority  ?  They  had  disclaimed 
their  professional  function,  and  confessed  them- 
selves unequal  to  their  own  theory. 

These  Pharisees  may  stand  as  the  representa- 
tives of  a  numerous  class  of  professedly  perplexed 
persons,  who  have  the  solution  of  their  doubts 
in  their  own  hands,  if  but  their  prejudices  would 
permit  them  to  own  it.  The  greater  issues  of 
behef  are  at  once  presented  and  disguised  by  the 
most  elementary  of  moral  obHgations.  Be  loyal 
to  the  last,  and  you  will  not  miss  the  first.  There- 
fore the  Christian  rehgion  is  not  truly  repre- 
sented as  a  schedule  of  credenda;  only  in  a  very 
artificial  and  secondary  sense  is  it  true  to  say 
with  the  Athanasian  Creed  that  the  Catholic 
Faith  "is"  a  long  series  of  metaphysical  propo- 
sitions. These  may  be  sound  and  for  some  pur- 
poses serviceable,  but  they  lie  aside  from  the 
essence  of  Christianity.  All  could  be  firmly 
grasped  by  one  who  had  no  ^^ faith  work- 
ing by  love."  None  need  be  known,  still  less 
imderstood,  by  one  who  yet  ^'followed  Jesus  in 
the  way"  of  discipleship.  The  conscience  is 
iminterested  in  metaphysics;  and  the  will  has 
but  a  languid  concern  in  philosophy.  Only  then 
does  religion  become  living  and  powerful,  when 
it  wakens  the  conscience  and  bends  the  will. 
The  Authority  of  Christ  is  preeminently  re- 
vealed in  the  fact  that  He  commands  the  assent 
of  the  conscience,  and  directs  the  movements  of 


268      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

the  will.  This  was  the  authority  which  He 
exercised  upon  His  disciples;  this  gave  such 
mysterious  impressiveness  to  His  teaching;  and 
at  once  attracted  and  perplexed  His  contempo- 
raries : 

"Nothing  is  less  like  Jesus,"  writes  that  wise 
and  illuminating  teacher,  Dr.  Denney,  "than 
to  do  violence  to  anyone's  hberty,  or  to  invade 
the  sacredness  of  conscience  and  of  personal 
responsibility;  but  the  broad  fact  is  unquestion- 
able, that  without  coercing  others  Jesus  domi- 
nated them,  without  breaking  their  wills  He 
imposed  His  own  will  upon  them,  and  became 
for  them  a  supreme  moral  authority  to  which 
they  submitted  absolutely,  and  by  which  they 
were  inspired.  His  authority  was  imcondition- 
ally  acknowledged  because  men  in  His  presence 
were  conscious  of  His  moral  ascendency,  of  His 
own  devotion  to  and  identification  with  what 
they  could  not  but  feel  to  be  the  supreme  good. 
We  cannot  explain  this  kind  of  moral  or  practical 
authority  further  than  by  saying  that  it  is  one 
with  the  authority  which  the  right  and  the  good 
exercise  over  all  moral  beings."' 

The  Church  argues  securely  from  the  unique 
moral  authority  possessed  by  Jesus  to  His  unique 
moral  excellence,  for  human  experience  every- 
where holds  these  together  in  an  exact  and  un- 
failing relation.     The  measure  of  moral  influence 

^v.  "Diet,  of  Christ  and  the  Gospels,"  I,  147. 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       269 

is  precisely  the  quality  of  moral  character.  Here 
the  saying  holds:  "To  him  that  hath  it  shall  he 
given:  from  him  that  hath  not  shall  be  taken  away 
even  that  which  he  hath^  Time  tests  the  pro- 
visional estimates  which  men  form  of  one  another, 
and  experience  disallows  whatsoever  authority 
has  been  conceded  without  adequate  basis  in 
character;  the  demonstration  of  moral  authority, 
the  revelation  of  its  credentials,  is  in  the  wear  and 
tear  of  Hfe.  The  fourth  evangelist,  whose  record 
perhaps  rather  gains  than  loses  in  spiritual 
value  when  we  recognize  that  it  is  not  so  much 
a  history  as  an  inspired  interpretation  of  Christ, 
indicates  the  nature  of  His  right  to  men's  homage, 
when  he  represents  our  Lord  as  directly  challen- 
ging the  verdict  of  His  contemporaries  on  Himself: 
"  Which  of  you  convicteth  me  of  sin  ?  if  I  say 
truths  why  do  ye  not  believe  me  ?"  The  right 
to  belief  cannot  be  separated  from  the  recog- 
nition of  His  moral  adequacy  for  the  authority 
He  claims.  One  clear  lapse  from  goodness,  and 
that  authority  expires:  the  fact  that  Christ's 
authority  retained  its  hold  over  His  followers, 
and  has  ever  since  succeeded  in  gaining  hold 
over  men,  is  the  proof  that  its  foundation  in  per- 
sonal goodness  is  secure.  Moral  influence,  more- 
over, is  singularly  responsive  to  the  moral  state 
of  those  over  whom  it  has  been  exercised.  The 
good  draw  ever  to  the  good:  "  The  pure  in  heart 
see  God.'"    No  certificate  of  character  is  more 


270      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

unfavourable  than  that  which  is  impHcit  in  the 
fact,  that  a  man  is  unresponsive  to  the  influence 
of  genuine  goodness.  There  is  therefore  always 
something  morally  critical  in  every  contact  with 
superior  goodness;  we  perforce  discover  our  own 
moral  state  when  we  are  in  presence  of  a  Saint. 
It  was  the  inevitable  cry  of  the  possessed  man 
when  Christ  encountered  him,  "What  have  I 
to  do  with  thee,  Jesus,  thou  Son  of  the  Most 
High  God  ?  I  beseech  thee,  torment  me  not." 
There  is  a  law  of  moral  kinship,  a  solidarity  of 
good  and  of  evil,  a  natural  drawing  together  of 
like  with  Hke;  and  this  law  of  spiritual  congruity 
operates  over  the  whole  area  of  human  intercourse, 
determining  both  the  comradeships  of  the  boy 
and  the  rehgious  allegiance  of  the  man.  '^My 
mystery  is  for  me  and  for  the  sons  of  my  house  "  is 
a  saying  attributed  to  Christ  in  early  times,  and 
it  seems  to  indicate  just  this  moral  harmony  which 
must  exist  between  Him  and  those  who  can 
respond  to  His  influence.  The  same  truth  is 
illustrated  by  His  insistence  on  the  childhke 
character  as  a  sine  qud  tion  for  entrance  into  the 
Kingdom;  and  in  another  connection  it  reappears 
impressively  in  the  Lord's  Prayer  where  Divine 
forgiveness  and  human  forgiveness  are  strangely 
and  suggestively  linked. 

So  I  will  assume  that  this  question  of  the 
Sanhedrin,  asked  in  the  blindness  of  professional 
prejudice,  is  asked  by  some  of  us  in  the  distress 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       271 

of  spiritual  perplexity:  ^^By  what  authority  doest 
thou  these  things,  or  who  gave  thee  this  authority 
to  do  these  things  ? "  We  too  must  find  the 
solution  of  the  problem  of  Jesus,  for  His  spell  is 
upon  us,  and  we  have  been  brought,  as  countless 
thousands  before,  to  the  crossways  of  final  de- 
cision, where  our  whole  faith  in  truth  and  good- 
ness, nay  our  whole  self-respect  and  our  loyalty 
to  the  inner  voice  of  duty,  turn  on  our  attitude 
to  Him.  For  us,  then,  as  for  those  Jews,  the 
answer  to  the  question  is  to  be  found  in  another 
direction  than  that  which  we  supposed.  We  must 
go  back  to  the  elements  of  religion,  and  take  the 
testimony  of  our  own  earlier  and  more  normal  con- 
duct. The  "Baptism  of  John,''^  that  is,  the  simple 
issue  of  right  conduct  which  faced  us  at  the 
beginning  of  conscious  life,  and  faces  us  daily 
with  more  threatening  insistence  as  the  years 
pass,  can  settle  the  point,  What  is  our  behaviour 
there?  How  do  we  judge  our  obligation  with 
respect  to  ordinary  duty? 

Christ's  authority  has  its  meaning  revealed  in 
our  own  conscience,  and  the  secret  of  its  un- 
earthly strength  disclosed,  by  its  correspondence 
with  all  that  we  have  within  our  own  lives  of 
purity  and  justice  and  love.  His  claim  is  uttered 
in  the  beckonings  of  duty;  His  character  made 
known  in  the  responsive  ardours  of  our  own  best 
selves.  The  truth  about  Him  is  written  on  the 
fragment  of  papyrus  which  recently  was  disin- 


272      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

terred  from  the  sands  of  Egypt:  "Jesus  saith: 
^'Wherever  there  are  two,  they  are  not  without 
God's  presence:  and  where  there  is  one  only,  I 
say,  I  am  with  him.  Raise  up  the  stone,  and 
there  thou  shalt  find  Me;  cleave  the  tree  and  I 
am  there.'' 

Yes;  "raise  up  the  stone"  of  trouble,  the  world's 
burden  of  sorrow  and  oppression  which  none  may 
wholly  escape,  and  which  falls  on  some  with 
direct  and  desolating  insistence,  and  there,  bend- 
ing sadly  but  with  unbroken  spirit  under  its 
weight,  thou  shalt  find  Me,  nay,  that  burden  also 
shall  become  the  Cross,  My  Cross,  which  saves 
the  world.  "Cleave  the  tree,"  that  is,  put  hand 
to  the  plough  of  life's  work,  and  in  spite  of  its 
deadening  routine,  and  strange  disappointments, 
it  shall  become  sacramental,  bringing  a  Real 
Presence  of  Christ  into  the  day's  toil.  "  Cleave 
the  tree  and  I  am  there."  Obedience  is  the 
guarantee  of  faith.  "Solvitur  ambulando"  is  the 
formula  of  spiritual  illumination.  "  If  any  man 
willeth  to  do  his  will  he  shall  know  of  the  teach- 
ing, whether  it  be  of  God,  or  whether  I  speak  from 
myself.'"  He  who  has  accepted  John's  Baptism 
of  Repentance  shall  not  fail  finally  to  receive  also 
Christ's  Baptism  of  the  Spirit.  But  Faith  has 
its  own  order;  there  is  but  one  entrance  to  its 
shrine.  We  must  first  hear  the  Stern  Preacher 
of  Righteousness;  and  then,  when  this  lesson  is 
mastered,  follow  Christ. 


XI 


CHRISTIAN  TEACHING 


Give  not  that  which  is  holy  unto  the  dogs, 
neither  cast  your  pearls  before  the  swine,  lest  haply 
they  trample  them  under  their  feet,  and  turn  and 
rend  you.     (St.  Matthew  vii.  6.) 

The  didactic  principle  implicit  in  these  words 
is  universally  admitted.  In  order  that  knowledge 
may  be  received  rightly,  it  must  be  correlated 
intelligently  with  the  recipient's  previous  knowl- 
edge. The  teacher  is  concerned  quite  as  much 
with  the  contents  of  his  pupil's  mind  as  with  the 
contents  of  his  own.  There  is  as  much  divination 
as  information  in  the  art  of  teaching.  This 
didactic  principle  holds  good  over  the  whole  field 
of  knowledge.  No  kind  of  knowledge  can  be 
received  rightly  save  in  so  far  as  this  principle  is 
respected;  but  most  of  aU  within  the  sphere  of 
religion  is  this  the  case,  for  there  the  conditions 
of  receiving  truth  are  more  complex.  The 
process  of  learning  is  moral  even  more  than  in- 
tellectual. Prejudice  and  passion  must  be  reck- 
oned with  as  well  as  ignorance  and  error;  the 
subtle  and  largely  unsuspected  influence  of  habits 
273 


2  74       THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

on  thought  must  be  allowed  for,  as  well  as  degrees 
of  natural  intelligence.  Experience,  moreover, 
confirms  the  statement  that  great  risks  attend 
the  neglect  of  this  didactic  principle  of  accommo- 
dation. Knowledge,  offered  to  those  who  are 
incapacitated  by  prejudice  for  its  reception,  may 
move  them  to  resentment  and  even  to  violence. 
Knowledge,  forced  prematurely  on  simple  and 
ignorant  men,  receives  from  them  the  most  danger- 
ous distortion,  and  may  become  in  their  hands 
the  occasion  and  instrument  of  far-reaching  mis- 
chiefs. What  the  Wise  Man  said  of  tactless 
rebuking  of  faults  is  equally  true  of  injudicious 
disturbance  of  error,  "i^g  that  correcteth  a 
scorner  getteth  to  himself  shame:  and  he  that 
reproveth  a  wicked  man  getteth  himself  a  blot: 
reprove  not  a  scorner,  lest  he  hate  thee:  reprove 
a  wise  man,  and  he  will  love  thee.'' 

The  reason  of  this  necessity  of  accommodation 
in  teaching  lies  in  the  very  conditions  under 
which  the  human  race  advances  from  primitive 
savagery  to  its  highest  level  of  attainment.  Man- 
kind does  not  maintain  an  equal  pace  of  progress; 
no  two  individuals,  probably,  stand  precisely  on 
the  same  plane  of  mental  and  moral  develop- 
ment; at  any  given  point,  a  great  variety  of  phases 
of  human  evolution  coexist. 

Charity  therefore,  no  less  than  reason,  ad- 
monishes the  teacher  to  be  slow  to  disturb  exist- 
ing notions  however  crude,  to  be  tolerant  of  error, 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       275 

to  acquiesce  in  the  concealment  of  truth,  to  give 
heed  to  the  Divine  warning  not  to  pluck  up  the 
tares  lest  wheat  be  plucked  up  with  them.  It  is 
the  fact  that  truth  can  only  be  received  in  forms 
and  by  modes  adapted  to  the  specific  case  of  the 
individual  recipient;  that  no  scrupulousness  of 
sincerity  on  the  teacher's  part  can  guard  his 
teaching  against  inevitable  misconception:  that 
modesty  requires  him  to  remember,  that  the  clear- 
ness of  his  own  perceptions,  and  the  strength  of 
his  own  convictions,  provide  no  sufficient  pledges 
of  the  rightness  of  his  doctrine.  Along  these 
lines  of  thinking,  however,  we  are  quickly  led 
to  conclusions  which  are  demoralizing  alike  to 
teachers  and  taught.  For  great  interests  grow 
round  all  estabHshed  and  accustomed  systems  of 
belief,  so  that  these  systems  have  their  hold  on 
men  by  other  titles  than  their  fitness  to  communi- 
cate truth.  The  worth  of  superior  illumination 
seems  doubtful,  and  the  duty  of  declaring  it 
seems  uncertain,  to  the  man  whose  comfort  and 
importance  are  contingent  on  his  adherence  to 
the  general  opinions.  The  argument  has  been 
stated  by  a  master  in  that  luminous  poem, 
"Bishop  Blougram's  Apology,"  and  it  is  a  cogent 
one. 

When  we  consider  that  the  steadfast  hold 
On  the  extreme  end  of  the  chain  of  faith 
Gives  all  the  advantage,  makes  the  difference 
With  the  rough  purblind  mass  we  seek  to  rule: 


276       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

We  are  their  lords,  or  they  are  free  of  us, 

Just  as  we  tighten  or  relax  our  hold. 

So,  other  matters  equal,  we'll  revert 

To  the  first  problem  —  which,  if  solved  my  way 

And  thrown  into  the  balance,  turns  the  scale  — 

How  we  may  lead  a  comfortable  life, 

How  suit  our  luggage  to  the  cabin's  size. 


It  is  not,  of  course,  inconceivable  that  the  ways 
of  duty  and  interest  may  sometimes  coincide; 
that,  to  borrow  a  phrase  from  Lord  Acton, 
"the  shrill  utterance  of  opportune  prophecy  may 
not  always  be  inconsistent  with  integrity,"  but 
at  least  it  must  be  admitted  that  the  experience 
of  mankind  has  not  often  witnessed  the  coin- 
cidence, or  certified  the  consistency.  On  the 
whole  we  may  be  sure  that  it  is  a  just  instinct 
that  makes  us  suspicious  of  a  didactic  caution, 
which  is  visibly  connected  with  the  teacher's 
material  advantage,  and  makes  us  sceptical  of 
the  intellectual  modesty,  which  quite  plainly 
serves  professional  interests.  Nevertheless  the 
practical  difficulty  remains,  and  the  most  honest 
of  men  cannot  evade  it ;  and  if  experience  testifies 
to  the  immoral  complaisance  of  interested  teachers, 
it  equally  testifies  to  the  immense  mischiefs  of 
reckless  ones.  Nor  is  recklessness  to  be  acquitted 
of  selfishness  because  it  commonly  inflicts  hard- 
ship on  the  reckless  teacher.  There  is  an  intellec- 
tual arrogance  which  in  its  vain  self-absorption 
omits  to  calculate  consequences,  which  yet  as- 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       277 

suredly  has  nothing  in  common  with  that  awful 
reverence  for  truth,  which  inspires  the  genuine 
Martyr's  defiance  of  prevailing  beliefs.  We  may 
allow,  perhaps,  that  for  the  highest  type  of  teacher 
a  certain  temptation  arises  from  the  manifest  in- 
consistency of  plain  speaking  and  self-advantage, 
so  that  he  is  apt  to  belittle  the  obligations  of 
charity  and  prudence  in  teaching,  lest  he  shall 
injure  his  own  self-respect,  or  save  himself  one 
fraction  of  the  full  cost  of  his  inviolate  inde- 
pendence. This  is  a  temptation  none  the  less 
dangerous  because  it  is  subtle,  and  its  effects  on 
character  are  really  mischievous,  albeit  they  are 
disguised. 

It  is  manifest  that  the  trials  to  which  we  have 
adverted  wiU  be  specially  acute  at  those  epochs 
of  Christian  history,  in  which  a  wide  discrepancy 
has  grown  between  the  knowledge  of  the  learned 
few,  and  the  beliefs  of  the  illiterate  multitude. 
Some  discrepancy  probably  must  always  exist, 
and  in  no  circumstances  can  the  teacher's  prob- 
lem be  completely  solved,  but  there  are  times 
when  the  discrepancy  becomes  abnormally  great, 
when  the  strain  on  the  teacher's  wisdom  and 
honesty  is  exceptionally  severe,  when  the  risks  of 
reckless  teaching  are  plainly  extreme.  At  such 
times,  perhaps,  there  is  special  reason  for  con- 
sidering carefully  the  warning  of  Christ  in  the 
text,  realizing  what  it  demands  of  us,  and  finding 
the  true  limit  of  its  reference.     Two  opposed 


278      THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

conceptions  of  duty  never  fail  to  present  them- 
selves at  these  times  of  special  difficulty,  and 
both  can  offer  strong  supports  in  reason  and  in 
reUgion.  The  first,  and  most  obvious,  is  that  of 
the  advocate  of  "Reserve,"  who,  fastening  on 
the  necessity  of  some  discrepancy  between  knowl- 
edge and  faith,  extends  the  argument  to  cover 
the  case  of  all  discrepancy,  and  preaches  the 
duty  of  acquiescing  in  two  types  of  Christianity, 
an  exoteric  and  an  esoteric.  The  last,  and  less 
common,  is  that  of  the  Prophet  or  Reformer, 
who,  fastening  on  the  Divine  rights  of  the  con- 
science, and  disdaining  the  sheker  of  conven- 
tional accommodations,  insists  on  proclaiming, 
urU  et  orbi,  the  newest  discoveries  of  truth,  or  of 
what  looks  hke  truth,  and  disclaims  responsi- 
bihty  for  the  consequences. 

"Reserve"  is  a  famous  word  in  Christian 
history;  and  we  may  well  arrest  our  argument  to 
consider  it.  Very  early  in  the  experience  of  the 
Church,  as  early  as  the  first  contact  of  the  Gospel 
with  Greek  thought  and  knowledge,  the  apparent 
necessity  of  calculated  concealment  of  truth  was 
forced  on  educated  Christians.  In  the  long  con- 
flict with  Gnosticism  it  would  appear  that  the 
victorious  Church  came  out  of  the  strife  deeply 
affected  by  its  adversary.  The  Alexandrine 
Fathers  borrowed  the  weapons  of  their  subtle 
dialectic  from  no  Christian  armoury.  Let  me 
quote    some    words    of    an    honoured    Oxford 


THE   LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       279 

teacher,  whose  recent  loss  is  regretted  far  be- 
yond the  limits  of  his  own  university.  In  his 
famous  Bampton  Lectures,  the  late  Professor 
Bigg  thus  comments  on  the  didactic  system  of 
the  Alexandrine  Fathers:  — 

"It  is  possible  to  defend  the  practice  of  Re- 
serve, if  it  be  taken  to  represent  the  method  of 
a  skilful  teacher,  who  will  not  confuse  the  learner 
with  principles  beyond  his  comprehension.  This, 
however,  is  by  no  means  what  the  Alexandrines 
intended.  With  them  it  is  the  screen  of  an  esoteric 
belief.  They  held  that  the  mass  of  men  will 
necessarily  accept  the  symbol  for  the  idea,  will, 
that  is,  be  more  or  less  superstitious.  It  is 
enough  if  their  superstition  be  such  as  to  lead 
them  in  the  right  direction.  This  is  a  necessary 
corollary  of  the  new  compromise  between  the 
Church  and  the  world,  a  taint  inherited  from  the 
Greek  schools  in  which  Truth  was  not  a  cardinal 
virtue.  Freedom  remains,  but  it  is  a  freedom 
of  the  elite,  which  may  be  tolerated  so  long  as 
it  does  not  cry  aloud  in  the  streets.  But  let  us 
remember  the  Alexandrines  were  pleading  for 
the  freedom,  not  for  the  restriction.  It  was  not 
altogether  their  fault  if  they  were  driven  to 
approximate  on  this  point  to  the  dreaded  Gnos- 
tics." ' 

Here  the  special  risk  of  every  doctrine  of  "Re- 
serve"  is  clearly  indicated.     What  begins  as  a 

^v.  Page  145. 


28o      THE    LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

method  is  perpetuated  as  a  principle.  What 
starts  in  the  interest  of  teaching  ends  in  the  inter- 
est of  stereotyping  ignorance.  What  was  didactic 
becomes  obscurantist.  We  may  see  the  same 
melancholy  transformation  exhibited  in  that  criti- 
cal epoch  in  which  the  modern  world  received  its 
distinctive  shape  and  direction.  Perhaps  at  no 
other  time,  with  the  possible  exception  of  our 
own,  was  the  discrepancy  between  the  knowledge 
of  the  educated  few  and  the  belief  of  the  unedu- 
cated many  so  wide.  The  risk  of  any  attempt  to 
reduce  it  was  extreme;  the  temptation  to  acquiesce 
in  it  was  strong.  A  strange  eclecticism  spread 
quickly  among  the  scholars,  while  the  multitude 
were  left  to  their  mediaeval  superstitions.  Free- 
thinking  in  the  circles  of  the  educated  and  wealthy 
was  conditioned  by  a  rigid  orthodoxy  in  the  work- 
ing system  of  the  Church.  The  triumph  of  in- 
tellectual liberty  was  to  be  complete  within  the 
universities  on  condition  that  it  found  no  expres- 
sion in  the  parishes.  Take  a  conspicuous  and 
representative  example.  A  typical  Humanist  was 
MuTiANUS  RuFUS,  who  "  adopted  the  conception 
of  combining  Platonism  and  Christianity  in  an 
eclectic  mysticism  which  was  to  be  the  esoteric 
Christianity  for  thinkers  and  educated  men,  while 
the  popular  Christianity,  with  its  superstitions, 
was  needed  for  the  common  herd."  "  In  private," 
writes  Professor  Lindsay,  "he  denounced  the 
fasts  of  the  Church,  confession,  and  masses  for 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       281 

the  dead,  and  called  the  begging  friars  'cowled 
monsters.'  He  says  sarcastically  of  the  Christi- 
anity of  his  times:  'We  mean  by  faith  not  the 
conformity  of  what  we  say  with  fact,  but  an 
opinion  about  divine  things  founded  on  creduHty 
and  a  persuasion  which  seeks  after  profit.  Such 
is  its  power  that  it  is  commonly  believed  that  to 
us  were  given  the  keys  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 
Whoever,  therefore,  despises  our  keys  shall  feel 
our  nails  and  our  clubs.  We  have  taken  from 
the  breast  of  Serapis  a  magical  stamp  to  which 
Jesus  of  Galilee  has  given  authority.  With  that 
figure  we  put  our  foes  to  flight,  we  cozen  money, 
we  consecrate  God,  we  shake  hell,  and  we  work 
miracles;  whether  we  be  heavenly  minded  or 
earthly  minded  makes  no  matter,  provided  we  sit 
happily  at  the  banquet  of  Jupiter.'  But  he  did 
not  wish  to  revolt  from  the  external  authority  of 
the  Church  of  the  day.  'He  is  impious  who 
wishes  to  know  more  than  the  Church.  We 
bear  on  our  forehead,'  he  says,  'the  seal  of 
the  Cross,  the  standard  of  our  King.  Let  us 
not  be  deserters;  let  nothing  base  be  found  in 
our  camp.'"^ 

This  attempt  to  maintain  a  double  system  could 
not  possibly  succeed,  because  in  truth  it  was 
self-contradictory.  To  concede  liberty  anywhere 
is  ultimately  to  concede  it  everywhere;  and  if 
the  concession  is  not  made  by  the  Church,  it  will 

^v.  "History  of  the  Reformation,"  vol.  I,  p.  65  f. 


282      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

be  made  against  the  Church.  Scepticism,  of 
course,  may  remain  in  a  rigidly  orthodox  church; 
but  its  confession  will  be  prohibited  even  within 
the  circles  of  the  educated.  Either  the  univer- 
sities will  lead  the  parishes;  or  the  parishes  will 
lead  the  universities.  The  Roman  Church  was 
slow  to  learn  the  lesson.  At  the  start  of  the 
Renaissance,  it  seemed  to  many  that  the  great 
intellectual  enfranchisement  would  be  directed 
by  the  Church ;  but  very  soon  it  became  manifest 
that  the  two  were  natural  foes.  So  long  as  the 
attempt  was  made  by  means  of  a  poHcy  of  "Re- 
serve" to  propitiate  the  scholars  without  shock- 
ing the  faithful,  the  Roman  Church  was  embar- 
rassed by  an  inner  contradiction,  and  gave  way 
continually  before  the  Reformation,  but  so  soon 
as  unity  of  purpose  was  restored  by  the  repudia- 
tion of  the  scholars,  the  Reformation  was,  to  the 
lasting  injury  of  Religion,  everywhere  arrested. 
"The  great  and  rapid  victories  of  the  sixteenth 
century,"  says  Lord  Acton,  "were  gained  over 
the  unreformed  and  disorganized  Catholicism  of 
the  Renaissance,  not  over  the  Church  which  had 
been  renovated  at  Trent.  Rome,  with  a  con- 
tested authority  and  a  contracted  sphere,  devel- 
oped greater  energy,  resource,  and  power  than 
when  it  exercised  undivided  sway  over  Chris- 
tendom in  the  West.  The  recovery  was  accom- 
plished by  violence,  and  was  due  to  the  advent 
of  men  who  did  not  shrink  from  blood  in  place 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING    283 

of  the  gracious  idealists  for  whom  Luther  and 
Calvin  were  too  strong."* 

While  then  the  Roman  Church  in  that  eventful 
epoch  attempted  an  impossible  combination,  and 
practised  an  essentially  immoral  "Reserve,"  the 
Reformers  fell  into  the  opposite  error.  Carried 
away  by  enthusiasm,  and  supposing  that  truths, 
which  they  themselves  found  spiritually  satisfy- 
ing, must  be  as  much  to  all  who  heard  them,  they 
proclaimed  to  multitudes,  whose  simplicity  and 
ignorance  were  extreme,  doctrines  which  only  a 
high  level  of  spiritual  attainment  could  render 
edifying.  In  the  phrase  of  the  Gospel,  they 
"gave  that  which  is  holy  unto  the  dogs,""  and 
''cast  their  pearls  before  the  swine''  The  con- 
sequences which  followed  were  the  reproach  of 
the  Reformation,  and  probably  did  far  more  than 
the  efforts  of  the  Jesuits,  or  the  faggots  of  the 
Inquisition,  to  send  men  back  in  panic  and 
disgust  to  the  older  system  which  they  had  aban- 
doned. The  Lutheran  doctrine  of  "Justifica- 
tion by  Faith  only"  became  associated  in  men's 
experience  with  the  most  shocking  excesses  of 
antinomian  fanaticism;  the  supremacy  of  the 
written  Word  became  in  the  hands  of  ignorant 
enthusiasts  the  negation  of  all  settled  authority 
in  the  Church;  the  fact  of  spiritual  equality, 
recklessly  proclaimed  to  discontented  and  miser- 
able multitudes,  became  the  logical  and  religious 

^v.  "Lectures  on  Modern  History,"  p.  124. 


284      THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

foundation  for  wild  schemes  of  social  revolu- 
tion, which  deluged  Germany  with  blood.  The 
"dogs"  and  "swine"  acted  as  the  Gospel  says 
they  will  act,  when  the  treasures  of  Divine  truth, 
which  they  can  neither  understand  nor  value, 
are  cast  to  them.  "  They  trampled  them  under 
their  feet,  and  turned,  and  rent"  the  reckless  givers. 
Nevertheless,  though  the  history  of  the  Reforma- 
tion offers  an  impressive  warning  against  neglect 
of  the  conditions  of  sound  teaching,  it  does  not 
seem  to  be  doubtful  that  the  Reformers  were 
right  in  their  main  principle. 

The  correlation  of  faith  and  knowledge  has 
been  maintained  in  the  Protestant  sphere  in  a 
measure  which,  outside  that  sphere,  cannot  be 
paralleled,  and  at  the  present  moment  the  Protes- 
tant churches  are  able  to  face  the  difficulties  of 
the  time  with  a  courage  and  hopefulness,  which 
are  visibly  absent  from  the  churches  which  re- 
fused to  accept  the  Reformation.  We  at  least 
are  free  from  the  disabling  contradiction  which 
seems  to  vitiate  the  position  of  the  modernists  in 
the  Roman  Church,  and  even  to  deprive  them  of 
the  moral  dignity  which  their  labours  and  suffer- 
ings might  well  earn  for  them.  We  cannot  but 
give  them  our  sympathy,  but  we  cannot  as 
readily  offer  our  approval.  They  are  reaUy  —  if 
I  do  not  misconceive  their  position  —  seeking  to 
persuade  the  Roman  Church  to  return  to  that 
immoral   duahsm  which  was   attempted  at  the 


THE   LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING       285 

Renaissance,  and  perforce  abandoned.  Their 
success,  which  however  is  inconceivable,  would 
secure  intellectual  liberty  at  the  price  of  moral 
paralysis.  Destructive  criticism  in  the  univer- 
sities cannot  coexist  with  Roman  orthodoxy  in 
the  parishes.  Better  a  hundred-fold  the  stress 
and  confusion  of  Protestantism  than  the  hypo- 
critical unanimity  of  a  CathoHcism  which  does 
not  believe  its  own  postulates.  Even  the  pur- 
blind and  tyrannous  obscurantism  of  the  Vatican 
is  morally  more  respectable  than  a  system  which 
cuts  off  the  faith  of  the  church  from  its  historic 
roots,  and  plays  with  sacred  words  and  acts  till 
they  lose  all  relation  either  to  the  reason  or  to 
the  conscience  of  believers.  If  I  permit  myself 
to  speak  thus  strongly  of  a  movement  which  is 
illustrated  by  great  learning  and  by  a  noble  self- 
sacrifice,  it  is  because  I  feel  that  the  deepest  in- 
terests of  Christianity  are  at  stake  in  disallowing 
the  claim  which  the  modernists,  or  some  of  them, 
are  making.  We  are  in  presence  of  the  old  alter- 
native, Erasmus  or  Luther,  an  intellectual  or  a 
religious  movement,  a  restatement  of  traditional 
behefs  determined  by  authority,  or  by  the  New 
Testament  realized  afresh  as  the  Message  of  God 
to  human  souls.  The  questions  which  Religion 
is  required  to  answer  remain  always  the  same; 
and  the  power  of  Religion  is  measured  by  its 
competence  to  answer  them.  It  is  the  besetting 
sin  of  academic  thinkers  to  magnify  unduly  the 


286       THE    LIBERTY   OF    PROPHESYING 

intellectual  aspects  of  Religion,  whereas  all  turns 
on  points  which  hardly  come  within  the  range  of 
controversy.  The  gravity  of  clinging  to  intel- 
lectual errors  arises  from  the  moral  degradation 
implied  in  refusal  to  recognize  truth,  far  more  than 
from  the  practical  importance  of  the  errors  them- 
selves. 

Bear  with  me  if  I  turn  from  historical  review 
and  general  statements  to  the  actual  situation 
with  which  we  ourselves  are  confronted.  In 
some  respects  that  situation  has  no  exact  par- 
allel elsewhere,  for  the  ecclesiastical  conditions 
of  this  nation  are  admittedly  unique.  Of  all 
the  Reformed  Churches  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land has  preserved  most  of  the  mediaeval  system 
in  its  government,  its  formularies,  and  its  spirit. 
There  has  been  great  spiritual  advantage  in  this, 
but  not  unmixed  advantage.  Some  serious  errors 
have  been  facilitated  by  it.  In  a  petty  insular 
version  the  experiment  of  the  Renaissance  is 
being  again  attempted  within  the  English  Church. 
There  are  those  among  us  who  would  concede 
large  liberty  of  thought  and  speech  within  the  uni- 
versities, who  yet  would  narrowly  restrain  such 
liberty  within  the  parishes.  Their  ideal  of  a 
Church  is  very  much  that  of  the  Alexandrines 
with  their  doctrine  of  "Reserve,"  or  of  the  earher 
Churchmen  of  the  Renaissance.  I  concede 
frankly  the  excuses  for  this  attitude,  and  I  do 
not  question  the  sincerity  of  those  who  maintain 


THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING       287 

it;  but  I  believe  nothing  more  firmly  than  that 
it  is  fundamentally  wrong,  and  can  only  bring 
disaster  on  the  Church.  It  implies  an  inner  con- 
tradiction fatal  to  self-respect,  and  ultimately 
destructive  of  religious  power.  Indeed  in  the 
long  run  I  do  not  believe  this  attitude  of  recog- 
nition with  limited  reference  is  possible.  Either 
the  universities  wiU  lead  the  parishes,  or  the 
parishes  w^iU  lead  the  universities;  in  other 
words,  a  church  must  be  on  one  side  or  the  other. 
In  the  intellectual  sphere  not  less  than  in  the 
moral  the  saying  is  ultimately  verified :  "  No  man 
can  serve  two  masters;  for  either  he  will  hate  the 
one,  and  love  the  other;  or  else  he  will  hold  to  one, 
and  despise  the  other.  Ye  cannot  serve  God  and 
Mammon.''^  Precisely  because  I  believe  this  so 
firmly,  I  would  take  leave  to  press  on  those  who 
hold  with  me  the  duty  of  heeding  the  warning 
words  of  our  Lord.  We  believe  that  "  Reserve  " 
is  only  legitimate  as  a  didactic  instrument;  that 
so  soon  as  it  fails  to  serve  the  interest  of  educa- 
tion it  ceases  to  be  legitimate;  that  the  test  of 
its  legitimate  use  is  the  degree  in  which  it  ceases 
to  be  necessary;  that  the  goal  towards  which  as 
teachers  we  are  bound  to  direct  our  efforts  is 
the  complete  disuse  of  it.  In  the  present  stage 
of  ecclesiastical  development  a  wide  discrep- 
ancy has  again  made  itself  apparent  between 
knowledge  and  belief,  and  there  is  no  educated 
man   who   is   not   conscious   of   the   fact.     The 


288      THE   LIBERTY   OF   PROPHESYING 

circumstances  of  modern  life  almost  compel 
the  authorities  of  the  Church  in  all  its  branches 
to  consider  how  this  fact  shall  be  dealt  with,  not 
merely  in  the  universities,  where  for  many  reasons 
their  direct  power  is  slight,  but  in  the  parishes, 
where  they  can  determine  the  course,  because 
they  can  make  or  mar  the  fortunes,  of  the  average 
clergyman.  The  notion  is  widely  distributed 
that  the  pubHc  teaching  of  the  churches  is  lacking 
in  candour,  that  it  does  not  express  the  knowledge 
of  the  clergy,  or  fairly  reflect  their  personal  con- 
victions. That  notion  is  widely  distributed  and 
freely  expressed  by  the  non-church-going  classes, 
but  our  church-goers  are  still  for  the  most  part 
wedded  to  the  forms  and  phrases  to  which  they 
have  been  accustomed,  and  extremely  resentful 
of  any  teaching  which  seems  to  handle  them 
roughly.  Unless  the  public  teaching  of  the  pul- 
pit is  to  fall  into  hopeless  discredit,  if  the  clergy 
are  not  to  forfeit  all  claim  to  be  teachers,  these 
timidly  conservative  congregations  have  to  be 
persuaded  to  alter  their  opinions,  to  abandon 
many  cherished  notions,  to  accept  a  larger  view 
of  Christianity  than  at  present  they  can  imagine. 
The  practical  problem  which  the  clergyman,  as 
teacher,  has  to  solve  is  how  to  present  the  novel 
and  unwelcome  truth  in  such  wise  that  it  shall 
not  alienate  but  persuade  the  hearers.  It  is 
neither  reasonable  nor  charitable  for  him  to 
force   on  those,   who  are    mentally  or    morally 


THE   LIBERTY    OF   PROPHESYING       289 

incompetent  to  understand  or  receive  his  doctrine, 
teachings,  however  in  his  own  eyes  true  and 
important,  which  can  only  startle  and  offend 
his  hearers.  The  very  difficulty  of  honest  teach- 
ing will  urge  him,  by  an  immoral  silence,  to  go 
the  way  of  least  resistance.  He  will  be  greatly 
tempted  to  conceal  his  convictions;  he  will  be 
officially  exhorted  and  encouraged  to  make  the 
contentment  of  his  congregation  the  standard 
of  his  success  as  a  teacher;  he  will  certainly  have 
little  or  no  professional  reward  for  attempting 
the  difficult  and  dangerous  task  of  teaching  sin- 
cerely. Every  failure  will  be  magnified:  every 
effort  will  be  misconstrued:  every  success  will 
be  belittled.  The  great  danger  at  present  is 
that  the  sense  of  official  disapprobation  will  in 
the  case  of  the  better  sort  of  clergyman  act  as 
an  incentive  to  recklessness  in  teaching;  and 
that  teaching,  thus  recklessly  given,  will  provoke 
resentments  and  create  panic  among  the  gener- 
ality of  church-goers.  To  the  English  clergyman 
to-day  as  he  puts  his  hand  to  the  task  of  religious 
teaching,  a  task  always  difficult  but  now  beset 
with  singular  risks,  the  warning  of  Christ  is 
manifestly  relevant:  "Give  not  that  which  is 
holy  unto  the  dogs,  neither  cast  your  pearls  before 
the  swine,  lest  haply  they  trample  them  under  their 
feet,  and  turn  and  rend  you.'" 

If  any  one  be  disposed  to  censure  harshly  the 
faults  of  those  whom  it  is  the  fashion  to  describe 


290        THE    LIBERTY    OF    POPHESYING 

as  "Liberal"  Churchmen,  I  would  venture  to 
advance  this  claim  on  their  behalf.  They  are 
standing,  at  some  personal  sacrifice  and  at  much 
personal  risk,  between  the  National  Church  and 
the  spiritual  sterility  which  must  sooner  or  later 
befall  every  church  which  accepts  the  ancient 
distinction  between  exoteric  and  esoteric  truth, 
not  merely  as  an  unavoidable  incident  of  eccle- 
siastical life,  but  as  a  settled  policy.  They  are 
affirming  the  principle  of  theological  progress, 
and  sustaining  the  standard  of  clerical  rectitude. 
They  are  the  mediators  between  the  universities 
and  the  parishes,  and  they  create  the  atmosphere 
of  public  interest  which  is  vital  to  the  influence 
of  academic  thought.  I  would  invoke  for  them 
the  sympathy  and  assistance  of  the  universities, 
and  if  I  might  dare  to  make  appeal  to  those 
cultivated  and  religious  laymen  who  approve 
their  efforts,  I  would  claim  from  them  something 
more  than  silent  and  passive  approbation.  With 
us,  however,  cheered  and  defended,  or  frowned 
upon  and  deserted,  it  is  matter  of  conscience 
that  we  should  hold  together  our  public  witness 
and  our  personal  conviction.  With  S.  Paul  we 
can  but  meet  the  critics  of  our  teaching  with  a 
reference  to  the  Divine  obligation  of  the  min- 
istry which  we  have  received:  "We  have  re- 
nounced the  hidden  things  of  shame,  not  walking 
in  craftiness,  nor  handling  the  word  of  God  de- 
ceitfully; but  by  the  manifestation  of  the  truth 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       291 

commending  ourselves  to  every  man's  conscience 
in  the  sight  of  God^ 

I  have  been  led  to  speak  specially  of  the  text  as 
applying  to  the  case  of  the  clergy,  embarrassed 
in  their  work  as  teachers  by  the  suspicions  and 
prejudices  of  believers;  but  I  must  not  bring  my 
sermon  to  an  end  without  a  reference  to  another 
application,  perhaps  more  important  for  most 
of  my  present  hearers.  An  university  is  the 
scene  of  free  discussion.  No  subject  is  too  sacred 
or  too  difficult  for  the  freest  handling  by  those 
whose  natural  intelligence  is  as  yet  unshadowed 
by  experience  and  unhampered  by  knowledge. 
Into  this  atmosphere  of  fierce  and  indiscriminating 
debate  the  Christian  youth  must  carry  the  tra- 
ditions of  piety  and  reverence  which  he  has 
received  from  home,  or  those  more  recent  and 
dominating  impressions  which  gather  round  the 
mysterious  fact  of  "conversion."  His  innocence, 
or  his  enthusiasm,  or  the  weak  complaisance 
of  his  nature,  may  lead  him  to  speak  freely  of 
Religion  in  company  where  the  very  meaning  of 
Religion  is  scarcely  known.  Let  him  be  on  his 
guard,  and  heed  the  words  of  the  Lord.  ''Give 
not  that  which  is  holy  unto  the  dogs."  The  con- 
temptuous phrase  ''dogs"  was  current  at  the  time 
on  Jewish  lips  as  a  synomym  for  Gentiles,  whom 
the  Jews  held  to  be  profane.  Later  the  word 
was  transferred  to  Christian  usage,  and  applied 
by  the  Gentile  believers  to  the  unbelieving  Jews. 


292       THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING 

"  As  a  term  of  reproach,"  says  Bishop  Lightfoot, 
"the  word  on  the  lips  of  a  Jew  signified  chiefly 
'  impurity ' ;  of  a  Greek,  '  impudence.' "  I  remind 
you  of  the  primitive  suggestions  of  the  scornful 
word,  because  these  distinct  but  kindred  quaUties 
of  impurity  and  impudence  attach  always  and 
everywhere  to  religious  discussions,  which  are 
carried  on  by  persons  who  themselves  are  irre- 
ligious. ''The  pure  in  heart  see  God,'^  said 
Christ.  ''Except  ye  become  as  little  children, 
ye  cannot  enter  the  Kingdom/^  He  said  again; 
exalting  thus  into  the  primary  conditions  of 
reUgious  apprehension  these  gracious  qualities  of 
purity  and  simplicity.  Take  care  then,  with 
whom  you  speak  of  religious  matters,  and  in 
what  spirit.  "Give  not  that  which  is  holy  unto 
the  dogs,  neither  cast  your  pearls  before  swine,  lest 
haply  they  trample  them  under  their  feet,  and  turn 
and  rend  you."  The  faithful  clergyman  ever  finds 
his  difficulties  from  the  prejudices  and  passions 
of  reUgious  people;  the  faithful  layman  most 
often  finds  his  from  those  of  irreligious.  To 
both  the  warning  of  Christ  has  manifest 
relevance. 

Every  one  of  us  is  primarily  responsible  for  the 
wardship  of  his  own  character;  none  of  us  can 
afford  to  neglect  that  trust;  for  the  strongest,  as 
we  reckon,  and  the  weakest,  the  humble  prayer 
which  the  Lord  gave  us  to  use  is  needed,  "Lead 
us  not  into  temptation. ' '     The  mere  fact  that  we  can 


THE    LIBERTY    OF    PROPHESYING       293 

talk  easily  before  unsympathetic  or  incredulous 
people  about  the  sacred  things  of  Religion,  that 
we  can  listen  without  a  holy  intolerance  to  un- 
worthy language  about  the  Faith  which  we  pro- 
fess, is  evidence  of  some  spiritual  failure,  and  may 
be  the  prophecy  of  more.  Forgive  me,  if  in  affec- 
tion and  concern,  I  pray  you  to  be  on  your  guard 
in  the  free  intercourse  of  this  place.  You  owe 
such  vigilance  to  yourself;  you  owe  it  to  those  in 
whose  company  you  are  brought;  above  all  you 
owe  it  to  Him,  Whose  Name  you  bear,  and  Whose 
pledged  servant  you  are. 


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